


Because it Hurts.

by 3DBABE1999



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Depression, Episode Related, Episode: s07e14 Plucky Pennywhistle's Magical Menagerie, Flashbacks, Hurt Sam Winchester, John Winchester's A+ Parenting, Past Abuse, Past Child Abuse, Past Rape/Non-con, Rape, Sam Winchester Angst, Sam Winchester Has Mental Health Issues, Sam Winchester Has PTSD - Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder, Sam Winchester Whump, Season/Series 08, Underage Rape/Non-con
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-08-22
Updated: 2019-09-06
Packaged: 2020-09-23 23:06:42
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Rape/Non-Con, Underage
Chapters: 13
Words: 216,646
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20348314
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/3DBABE1999/pseuds/3DBABE1999
Summary: ....This is a COMPLETED WORKI know.. So rare..This is something I wrote and Posted YEARS AGO on Fanfiction Dot Net..  I am Copy/Pasting.. But I'm not bringing in all of the A/N's with it the way they're Posted there because they won't make sense as the Fic is OLD.. I'll do an entire extra bit for ONLY SOME of the A/N's and WARNINGS at the end of the entire Fic.. This was Published in 2012 and Completed in 2014 and Supernatural was pissing me off with how they were treating Sam at the time..Picks up in Season 8 Episode 9 that Mid-Season Cliffhanger they left us with that Season ..





	1. Chapter 1

_ ***"There it is.. That ole' familiar face."..*...** _

_Sam finished the last of his whiskey then turned to leave. But as he turned he was stopped, frozen like a deer in the headlights by the sight of Amelia standing right there._

_"I knew that was you." She said sounding like she might cry._

_Sam understood. Seeing her was just as emotional for him as seeing him was for her._

_For a second it was hard for him to breath and he was pretty sure that his heart may have skipped a beat. Seeing her hurt in ways he could never express. Not because he loved her and had to let her go. No it was because he realized not long after having left her to let her have a chance at being actually happy with her husband, that he hadn't really loved her. Her dad had been right. He really had just been using her as something to hold on to. If it hadn't been for her talking him into caring for Riot then her having turned out being just as broken and in need of something to hold to as him, then he would have driven off an over hundred foot sheer drop off like he'd originally had planned months ago when Riot had ran in front of him and distracted him from that plan, which had thus lead him to Amelia who was in equally as bad a place as he had been. She had helped him find the will to keep living, to keep holding on for just a little longer. For that he would forever be grateful and he'd always care about her. But he didn't love her._

_He no longer felt that it was in his capacity to feel that deep of an emotion for anyone that hadn't already been his family when Cas and Dean exploded into a puddle of black ooze along with Dick Roman right before his eyes.. And that hadn't been anyone aside from Bobby, who was dead, Cas whose existance he had thought had been obliterated in the explosion and Dean who he had thought was killed in the eruption that had caused both Dean and Cas to disappear without a trace besides the black goo that had been left behind... And now that he'd been proven wrong about Dean's and even Castiel's deaths, Dean hated him, had found someone who had been a better brother to him in the course of a year than he himself had ever been and Cas was.. Cas was still just Cas. He was sure the angel considered him a friend, maybe even family, but he didn't know if the angel actually understood the emotions involved in real HUMAN relationships like friendship or family.. After all emotions weren't exactly always an angel's strong suit... Especially where Cas was concerned. In fact even just remembering his time with Amelia did nothing but make him remember what the pain of not having Dean anymore had felt like and since that pain was already still so raw, especially after everything that had been happening with Dean lately, actually seeing her again was causing him actual physical pain._

_But he knew he was in a predicament because Amelia looked as if she were expecting an explination, that he couldn't give, as to why he was there and whether he had really loved her or not, she had saved him and he owed her enough to give explaining himself a shot._

_"I didn't come to cause trouble.. or to make things hard for you. I just.. I wanted to stop by your place and make sure you were doing alright.. Then I realized that, that would make me look like a total stalker so I came here instead.. Needed a few drinks before I left town again." He said with a nervous chuckle._

_"Sam.. Just because we're not together anymore doesn't mean I don't still care about you... So I get it.. I do, I've been wanting to know if you were doing alright to.. I can't count how many times I almost called just so I could know.. And if I'd known where you'd run off to when you just up and disappeared the way you did I probably would've stalked around your place just to catch a glimpse of you."_

_Sam gave another nervous laugh and rubbed the back of his neck in a sheepish manner because that had been exactly what he'd done. Well of course he had cause to think she was in some kind of trouble.. But still.. He really had needed to know that she was alright._

_"So.. Are you.. Are you reconnecting with Don?.. Or.."_

_"We're back together.. But we're taking it slow.. Neither of us wants to just dive back into a relationship with.. Well It's only been a little over six months since he's been back and.".._

_"I can imagine how akward it's been." .. _ _ **Believe me I know first hand.** _ _ .. He thought. "I shouldn't have come.. I've probably only made things worse." .. _ _ **Story of my life.** _ _ .._

_"Sam you didn't make things.. Don understands.. And he.. He'd understand if you and I needed stay in touch. He'd be okay with us needing to talk. We've both been through some rough times lately and Don gets that."_

_Sam smiled, because Don was a good guy and of course he'd tell Amelia that it was okay if she "Stayed in touch." with the guy who had helped her keep living through a very difficult point in her life. But any man wouldn't want someone who had very nearly had his wife as their own to come barging back into his wife's life, not even as a friend. No matter what the circumstances had been and Sam was going to respect that and leave while he still could before Amelia got the wrong idea and that ended up starting trouble between her and Don later on down the road. Besides he had to many troubles with a brother that seemed to resent his very existance and a vampire that whether bad or not had killed a hunter and those things had to be addressed so he couldn't stick around and try to be "Just friends." with Amelia.. Even if he really wanted to... And he did want to.. Cause right now.. He could really use a friend._

_"I'm sure he does." Sam stated as he continued to force a truly emotionless smile "But I really do have to be going. It was nice seeing you again though. I'm glad you're doing okay and I wish only the best for you and Don."_

_Amelia looked saddened and hurt by the way he was so abruptly making his departure as he all to cooly brushed past her with a purposeful air of nonchalance. And yes, the way he was just leaving without so much as a backwards glance after having been so cold, hurt him as well, but he couldn't let it show. It was a dick thing of him to just show up saying he needed to check on her then act as if she didn't matter and he knew it. But he also knew that she'd be better off for it in the long run._

_The second he was seated in Martin's beat up old car he took out his cell phone and deleted Amelia's numbers from his contacts. This had just become yet another part of his life that he could never revisit again and it was best to just let it go, let her go, now..._

_ **... FLASHBACK ...** _

_ **As he blinked Sam was swept away by a truly horrifying moment.** _

_ **His eyes had turned into a viscous molten liquid that was oozing from his eye sockets. He was blind again. Lucifer just loved robbing him of one or more senses at a time and today it was his sense of sight and sense of touch in every part of his body from the neck down.** _

_ **He heard Lucifer laugh at him as he was left to wallow in the painful darkness for what he knew would be hours on end if not days.** _

_ **Apparently though Lucifer wanted to play and Sam felt some of the binds that had been wrapped so tightly around him that they'd cut of circulation and feeling being removed, releasing a cacophony of pins and needles that shot through his right leg. But Lucifer made no move that Sam could sense, with the only senses he had left, to remove any of the other bindings. Lucifer wanted Sam's suffering to be slow and deliberate after all.** _

_ **After what felt like an eternity.. And it possibly WAS an eternity.. It was The Cage after all.. Lucifer began to unwrap Sam's right arm which gave way to a new symphony of painful pins and needles radiating in time with his pulse as was the same rhythm the pain in his leg was keeping which only added to agony that Sam was feeling and in all honesty it felt shameful that the awakening of a numb limb could cause him so much pain.** _

_ **But Lucifer wasn't done. This sort of torture was only an appetizer and Sam knew he'd hate today's main course.** _

_ **And Sam was right. He was bound in a way he literally could not move a muscle that wasn't from the neck up, he was blind, helpless and already in shamefully severe pain when Lucifer turned the torture up a notch.** _

_ **Sam had thought that the pain in his eye sockets could get no worse now that his eyes had been liquified. He had been wrong. The pain could get worse and it did. Now the pain was so horrendous that it could not be described.** _

_ **His eyes felt ready to explode, which confused Sam. Because hadn't they been melted by Lucifer again only mere moments ago?** _

_ **He felt hands grabbing at him unexpectantly and this is what he'd known Lucifer would eventually resort to. Lucifer never could torture him without violating him in the worst possible manners. Never one to willingly allow anyone to touch him in such ways he fought back with the best of his ability only to find himself thrashing awake and bolting upright panting harshly as soothing words from someone seemingly far away tried to put him at ease.** _

_ **Sam let his breathing return to normal and soon the sound of his rapid pulse in his ears dissipated and Amelia started to sound closer.** _

_ **The throbbing behind his eyes and the tingling in his right arm and right leg had followed him from his nightmare into the waking world.. And this wasn't the first time.** _

_ **"Sweetie?" Amelia asked sounding concerned.** _

_ **"I'm okay now. It was just a nightmare."** _

_ **"Just a nightmare." She said sounding incredulous "Sam you sounded like you were being murdered!"** _

_ **"It was just a bad dream. I'm fine. Honest."** _

_ **"Yeah, just like last night it was just a bad dream and the night before that and the night before that and just like all those other times you're "fine" until tomorrow night when you start screaming in your sleep again. But you'll swear that it's a bad dream and that you're "fine" then to."** _

_ **"I'm sorry."** _

_ **"Sam.. I'm not mad. I'm worried about you. You can't keep going on like this. It's not healthy. You've suffered through a terrible loss and the pain of that is starting to affect your day to day life."** _

_ **She had no idea how right she was. It had been affecting his "day to day life" long before he'd ever even met her.** _

_ **"I think you should see someone."** _

_ **"Whoa!.. You mean like a shrink?!" Sam asked sounding offended.** _

_ **"Sam I know what you're thinking and seeing a counselor doesn't make you crazy. I had to see one after hearing that Don died. Sam I was in such a dark place that if I hadn't gone I wouldn't even be here right now."** _

_ **"But I'm fine. I'm not in a dark place like that. Ames you help keep me out of all those dark places.." He knew that she wasn't really who he needed at this moment.. But who he needed couldn't be here for him, so all he really had was her..** _

_ **"But Sam I'm not a professional. They have ways to help. There's medications that they can.."** _

_ **"MEDICATIONS?!.. Ames.. I don't need to be medicated! I'm NOT crazy."** _

_ **"Damn it Sam." Amelia growled as she pushed past him and into the bathroom. She started digging into one of cabinets and pulled out a small box and thrust it into Sam's massive hand asking "Am I crazy for needing these?"** _

_ **Sam turned the small box in his hand feeling bewildered as he read the label "2 Blister packs of 2 capsules. Prozac weekly. Fluoxetine hydrochloride. Delayed release capsules. Once weekly. Each capsule equivalent to 90mg fluoxetine."..** _

_ **"Once weekly?" He asked sounding interested. "You mean you don't have to?.."** _

_ **"Take them everyday? No. There's choices Sam. It's not something that has to rule your life. You don't have to let needing something like these define you."** _

_ **"I don't know Ames.. I mean I know that people who need anti-depressants aren't crazy. And I'm sorry for.."** _

_ **"Don't be the first time someone suggested it to me I had almost the exact same reaction you did. I get it. Trust me."** _

_ **"I just don't think I'm depressed. Well I'm.. It hurts that Dean is gone.. But.. It's.. And I don't know.. And what about the nightmares?.. They have nothing to do with being depressed."** _

_ **"They might. I had all kinds of nightmares right after finding out Don died." Amelia replied as she gave Sam's shoulder a comforting squeeze. "And there are medications that can help with the nightmares to."** _

_ **"But I just.. Will I.. Is it permanent?.. If I start taking stuff like this am I gonna have to take them for the rest of my life?"** _

_ **"For a guy who went to Stanford you're not too bright." Amelia joked.** _

_ **"I studied law Ames. I didn't have to think about stuff like this. And my brother would've have called me an emo girl if I'd ever said I thought I needed any of this kind of stuff."** _

_ **Amelia glared at him for the emo girl comment as Sam gave a sheepish "Sorry. I'm not saying you're an emo girl. Just that's what Dean would've said about me."** _

_ **Amelia was still glaring "Not that being emotional and a girl is a bad thing.. It's just what Dean would've said. To you know, tease me? He probably would've liked to pick on me for stuff like.." He held up the box that he still had in his hand "Me needing stuff like this."** _

_ **"Sounds like he was real sensitive." She said sarcastically.** _

_ **"He wouldn't do it to be insensitive, it would've been his way of.. Of letting me know that needing this stuff didn't change things. Of course I never would've admitted needing stuff like this to him even though I know he'd be.."** _

_ **"He'd want me to get the help I need." Sam whispered as it dawned on him.** _

_ **"And there it is. It took me a while to realize that Don would've wanted that for me to.. It was easier to let myself accept the help I needed once I realized Don would've wanted me to find the will to live again. And Dean would want that for you to Sam."** _

_ **"So how do I?.. Where do I start?" Sam asked.** _

_ **"Well I can make you an appointment with my counselor and if you don't like her you can ask her to refer you to someone else."** _

_ **"I still don't think a counselor is a good idea.. There's things that I.. Some shrink is NOT going to understand what I've.."** _

_ **"Just give it a try Sam. Please. You might be surprised."** _

_ **"Okay. Fine. You're right. At the very least I can maybe get something to help stop the nightmares."** _

_ **Amelia smiled and kissed him then said "Come on. Let's get back in bed. We've got a big day tomorrow."** _

_ **... FLASHBACK ENDS ...** _

_Sam blinked away the memory.. He remembered going to the counselor.. He remembered feeling bad about wasting her time because there was so much about his life that he couldn't be honest about.. But apparently the things he had been able to be honest about was enough for the counselor to confirm that he did indeed have Depression. She also told him that he may possibly also have Post Traumatic Stress Disorder as a result of witnessing a loved one die a violent death (He'd told the counselor that he'd watch Dean die in an accident during the demolition of a building.. Because "I watched my brother explode." seemed to need at least some elaboration and well he couldn't have exactly told the truth._

_The counselor reffered him to a psychiatrist so that he could get the prescriptions for the proper medications and the psychiatrist had been the one to figure out that not all of his symptoms were from just the Depression and Post Traumatic Stress Disorder. The psychiatrist had been the one to reffer him to the neurologist who had diagnosed his Multiple Scleroisis and the neurologist was the one to reffer him to the cardiologist who had diagnosed his Atrial Fibrillation. He'd just gotten used to taking all of the medications that he needed to manage all of his conditions, he was actually beginning to feel a little better when the call came that Amelia's husband was alive and Sam had begun to sink back into the pit of despair despite the medications. And now.. NOW with everything that was happening with Dean.. Well Sam had stopped seeing a point in keeping up with the medications weeks ago right after Dean had said what he'd said when possessed by the Spectre as he didn't really see much point in continuing to live after that.. The only thing that had kept him from killing himself then was that he didn't have the convenience of enough time without Dean to do so.. Maybe now would be a good time?_

_Sam gave a dry chuckle at the thought of just ending his life now. He really wanted to.. But then that would leave a possibly dangerous vamp to roam unchecked and if Dean was in the right head space then he'd be telling Sam not to shirk his responsibilities again. And the last thing Sam wanted was for Dean.. HIS Dean, who HIS Dean really was when he was thinking straight, to be disappointed in him... AGAIN.. And he knew his Dean would do it, had done it, for him. So he had to at least make sure that Benny wasn't really a threat before he could carry through with his continuously aborted plans to take his own life... For now.. All he could do was call Dean back and ask were they could meet._

_ **SIX WEEKS LATER...** _

When Castiel had come back in need of Sam and Dean's help with some new stunt that Crowley was pulling he had immediately picked up on the increased tension between the Winchester brothers. Cas had then summerily told Sam and Dean that he needed them bith to "Stow their crap." which in all honesty would have been hillarious to either brother in any other situation because they were both pretty sure that Cas didn't really know what he was saying meant.. It had just been sheer luck that Cas had managed to say something that had actually made sense in a commanding and authoritive tone that it had actually made sense in. And being as they were needed Sam and Dean did in fact "stow their crap" for that time being at least and once again all attempts to stop Crowley from whatever he was up to had failed and then Sam and Dean were right back to where they'd been when Cas had shown up, so the angel had stayed and had been trying to help rebuild bridges between Sam and Dean to no avail ever since.

No amount of talking could make either brother see what was really going on with the other and Cas knew that if things didn't change soon then the outcome would be disasterous.

Dean seemed to like continuously shutting Sam out by making it obvious how he preffered Castiel's company over Sam's and soon Sam was riding in the back of the Impala instead of in his usual seat by Dean's side. Which as much as Cas enjoyed getting to sit up front he hadn't wanted it to come at this cost. Then things progressed as Sam grew quieter and quieter and more and more distant, suddenly Sam wasn't eating at the same table as Dean, and that's only if he was eating at all and because Cas never slept he became aware of how much trouble Sam was having with sleep. Things were getting to a boiling point.. Fast and neither of the Winchester brothers could see it happening.

Things looked like they might change for the better when on a hunt in Wyoming Sam extended an olive branch and told Dean that if Dean wanted Benny to join them then he'd be willing to fly a flag of truce with Benny for Dean's sake unless the vampire got out of hand and Dean had cordially accepted. For a little less than two weeks Sam and Dean's bond seemed like it was on the mend, then Benny saved Dean's life again and Sam was cast back into the lonely shadows as Dean was once again treating Sam as if he could never be good enough and Sam began to wilt once more.

**PRESENT DAY...**

Garth had called needing help with a hunt so after Dean explained the situations with Benny being a vampire and Cas being an angel and made sure that Garth was cool with having Benny and Cas around he, Benny, Cas and Sam headed to Atlantic City, New Jersey and Dean couldn't have been more happy to be going to a place where he could fatten up their cash supply.

Garth told Dean that he'd already booked three rooms at the "Black Jack Inn" so that when they pulled into town all they had to do was unpack.

Dean talked Benny into sleeping somewhere else besides his "rolling deathtrap" for a few days and so Benny was going to share a room with Dean instead of Sam.. Which Cas honestly thought that Dean was taking isolating Sam as what Cas thought was an undeserved, punishment, a bit to far.. But Dean wouldn't listen to him...

The day after settling in Garth caught everyone up to speed.

Apparently there had been several attacks on several people all over Atlantic City.. But the attacks looked like the work of an angry spirit.. But the issue was the fact that the attacks where so wide spread and so seemingly broad spectrum that it wasn't a usual case of a salt and burn.. No, this looked like there may be another spectre at work... And unfortunately they had no way of knowing who the spirit was or what sort of object it may be possessing. The only way to get any leads was to talk to the victims who had survived the attacks and to all of the hunters' dismay, the only ones to survive the attacks were either completely catatonic or in comas...

With no way to talk to the only people who might have any useful info the group split up. Benny and Cas went with Dean and Sam teamed up with Garth.

Sam came across a chance lead that guided him to a ritzy, upscale hotel called the Rodagran and apparently Dean had come across a similar lead as Dean, Benny and Cas showed up at the hotel as well.

What Sam didn't know was that Garth had sent a text to Benny that told him about the lead and the two conspired to end up splitting off to force Dean to work with Sam.

Benny said he'd help Garth as someone who actually had their head in the game had to watch the skinny nerd's back (Benny played it off like he was insulting Sam to try and get some sort of brotherly response from Dean.. But it was to no avail.) and Cas was "suddenly" needed to go watch after the Trans. Meaning if Dean wanted back up he had to settle for Sam.

Garth and Benny took the ninth floor while Sam and Dean took the fifteenth floor as they were the floors the leads pointed to.

Dean stayed a good distance from Sam.. He couldn't stand having Sam in his space at the moment.. It had been that way for a while and it was beginning to fester.. It was becoming something dark within Dean.

Suddenly the temperature dropped. Dean let out a breath and could see how his breath became a mist in the cold. It signaled the spectre was near.

Dean had a dark thought and he gave Sam a look that would tell Sam exactly what it needed to convey "_It's my turn to let something get you._" then he closed a door that stood between him and Sam and locked Sam in the room with the spectre.. He didn't even know why he'd done that.. Yes he was still pissed at Sam.. But he'd never do something so unprofessional even if he were working with his worst enemy.

The second Sam was on the other side of the closed door the entire fifteenth floor erupted into flames.

Dean called Benny's cell and told him he needed him and Garth to get up there because Sam was trapped.. Of course he left out the fact that Sam was trapped because of him.

Apparently it wasn't just the fifteenth floor that was on fire.. But the whole hotel was going up in flames. Benny and Dean managed to break down the door to the room Sam was trapped in, just in time to see part of the ceiling collapse and land on top of Sam.

A white mist formed near Sam and Benny, Sam and Dean found themselves unable to move. The spirit flickered and took on more of a shape as it hovered over Sam's limp body, it reached out it's hand and caresses Sam's temple in an almost loving and sympathetic fashion then flickered back out and disappeared.

Dean scanned the rubble 

that was left in the wake of the fire, there were no signs of the spirit, it was just him, Garth, Benny and Sam.

Benny nodded that he would watch would watch everyone's backs while Garth and Dean hoisted the collapsed beam off of Sam.

Once the heavy metal beam was removed from on top of the unconscious Sam, Dean knelt down beside his little brother and started checking for signs of life.

"He's not breathing." Garth whispered in horror from Sam's other side.

Dean felt around Sam's neck for the thrumming of a pulse. There wasn't one.

"Help me get him flat on his back and tilt his head back." Dean ordered sternly.

Garth helped roll Sam to his back and then tilted Sam's head back as Dean instructed.

"Do you know C.P.R.?" Dean asked.

"Yeah." Garth answered sounding shaky.

"Start chest compressions. I'll breath for him. Benny call nine-one-one."

"On it brother." Benny replied as Garth stared chest compressions.

By the time the ambulance arrived, ten minutes had passed, it had been well past the amount of time that a time of death should have been called, but Dean wasn't giving up on Sam.

The paramedics managed to defibulate Sam's heart back into an unsteady rythm, but Dean counted that as a win because at least Sam's heart was beating again.

Dean tossed Benny the keys to the Impala and told him and Garth to go get Cas then to meet him and Sam at the hospital. Benny and Garth both nodded and rushed to do as they were told as Dean climbed up into the ambulance to sit as close to his little brother as the paramedics would allow.

The second the ambulance sqreeched to a stop in the ambulance dock of the hospital, everything turned to chaos. Apparently four other ambulances were also unloading other criticaly injured people that had been hurt in the fires that the angry spirit had caused in the business district. Sam was pulled away by three medical personel while the other four people were being pulled away from their shock stricken loved ones by teams of medical personel of their own.

Dean tried to stay close to Sam and when a nurse pulled him away from Sam's side and started ushering him into the waiting room, Dean echoed the distraught people around him when he cried "You don't understand. He's my family."

But he wasn't aware that everyone who was in there with him right then and there had said nearly the exact same thing about their loved ones, for he only had eyes and ears for anything that might be about Sam. He felt that he should be by his brother's side despite whatever the nurse who was pushing him into the waiting room with all of those other families was saying.

When all of the obligatory paper work was finally placed in Dean's hands all Dean could feel was anger at himself for what he'd done to Sam and when Benny and Garth arrived with Cas in tow Dean was no longer aware of very much more than his feelings of guilt...

And when the doctor came into the waiting room and gave him the news about some medical conditions that Sam had and then told him about Sam slipping into a coma all Dean could feel was despair...


	2. Chapter 2

Dean felt swallowed by despair as he found out that Sam lay in a coma. He gave a few stiff nods of understanding as the doctor explained how Sam had some underlying medical conditions that had helped contribute to not only Sam's earlier cardiac arrests, but also Sam's current state.

Dean ran a hand through his hair then walked back to the others with his head hung in shame.

"Is he gonna be okay?" Garth asked.

"He's in a coma." Dean replied.

"Is it because the spirit touched him?" Benny asked.

"I don't know." Dean admitted. "According to the doctor Sam has some medical conditions that might have contributed to what's wrong with him now."

"What kind of conditions?" Garth asked.

"Well they had to do an M.R.I. on him because of the way the beam landed on him... He's taken lots of severe hits to the head before.. There's so many times I should have..."

"Does Sam have brain damage?" Garth asked sounding really concerned.

"Some.. Most of it looks to be from what happened today, but god only knows how old the rest of it is or what sorts of symptoms he's been suffering because of it.. But that wasn't all that was found on Sam's brain scans."

"What else was there?" Benny asked.

"It's not a tumor or something like that is it?" Garth asked.

"No, Sam has lesions on his brain."

"What caused them?" Garth asked.

"The doctor is pretty sure that Sam has Multiple Sclerosis."

"Geez, brother that's.." Benny started to say.

"Oh that's not all." Dean stated sounding angry. "Sam has a heart condition to and the heart condition would have been manageable if found sooner and dealt with properly, but now it's become a life threatening condition that caused Sam to have two massive heart attacks, he went into Cardiac Arrest three times and he had a Hemorrhagic Stroke.. Which could really screw him up when added in with all the damage to his brain that was already there.. The doctor said that Sam might not wake up and if he does.. He could be severely impaired."

Garth put a hand to his mouth and made a sympathetic noise before saying "What do you need us to do?"

"Cas... Is there any way you can?.. Dean asked with a choked sob.

"I can attempt to heal Sam, but there is only so much that even a Seriph can do."

"Please try." Dean cried as the tears he'd been fighting to hold back finally began to fall.

"Can we go with you two to see him?" Garth asked.

Right now Dean was actually gratefull for the scrwany nerd's emppathy. The way Garth wanted to nothing but help both of his friends really reminded Dean of Sam and it helped endear Garth to him in that moment.

"Yeah. I'd really appreciate it." Dean replied as he wiped his eyes.

Dean froze in the doorway to Sam's room and Garth, Benny and Cas were blocked from entering as Dean stood there bracing himself in the door frame. "What the hell?" Dean growled.

The other three tried to see past Dean but the way Dean was brething signaled that he was pissed and soon the pther three slowly backed off as Dean growled out "Who the hell did this to my brother?"

Garth's curiousity won out over his need to see the next day because now he was trying to edge around a positively murderous Dean to try and see inside the room.

Luckily for Garth, Dean didn't start swinging, he just grabbed the door frame even tighter instead as Garth managed to steal a peak of Sam laying in the hospital bed.

At first nothing seemed amiss.. But of course with the way Dean was about Sam.. The fact that just a single strand of Sam's hair was out of place might've been all it had taken to set Dean off like this.

But then Garth's eyes adjusted to the harsh sunlight filtering into Sam's room and soon he could see more of the features on the once the mostly shadowy form that was Sam's face.

On Sam's left cheek someone had taken a knife, scapel or some other sharp instrument and carved into Sam's flesh. The carving was of a number "2" which made no sense to Garth.. Because.. WHY would someone do that to a person who lay in a coma?.. In fact.. Why would someone do that to anyone at all?

"I'll go get the doctor." Garth said in a hurried gasp of disdain for whoever had hurt his friend.

"What's going on?" Benny asked in his cajun drawl as he rushed after Garth.

"Someone carved into Sam's face!" Garth stated angrily as he walked with purposeful speed that told of how pissed he was.

"Who the hell would do such a thing?" Benny asked in obvious disgust.

"I don't know. But I hope Sam's doctor has a good proctologist, cause he's gonna need one to help get my foot out of his ass." Garth replied in a snarl.

"Well now I'd like to give the doc a beatin just cause he didn't stop this from happening to Sam. But we have to keep our cool or else we'll end up tossed from the hospital." Benny said matter of factly.

Garth let out a defeated sigh and said "You're right."

Just then they rounded the corner and almost bumped into Sam's doctor.

"Something's just happened to our friend Sam Taylor and his brother wants an explination. NOW." Garth demanded.

"What do you mean? I was just in there with Sam.."

Just then alarms from Sam's room started blaring and Garth, Benny and the doctor went running to Sam' room.

Now there were more carvings and they were on Sam's left temple and both Garth and Benny knew damn well that Dean and Cas were the only ones there and that neither of them would ever do something like this to Sam.

"What in GOD'S name happened here? Who did this?" The doctor demanded.

"That's what we were hoping you could tell us." Garth said in exasperation as even more slices were carved into the flesh of Sam's left forearm right before everyone's eyes.. Including the doctor's.

The doctor rushed to Sam's side as other medical personel made there way into the room.

People were jostling and shoving to jokey for position as the medical staff tried to work around the people who were refusing to leave Sam's side and the doctor was no help because any time any of the other medical staff tried to usher Dean, Garth, Benny or Cas out of the room the doctor would sternly bite out the words "They stay." then proceed to continue working on getting Sam's vitals as stable as possible.

Once the alarms were no longer blaring and the doctor was satisfied that Sam was in as good as condition that could be hoped for he ushered everyone but Dean, Garth, Benny and Cas out of the room.

"Tell me I wasn't the only one to see what just happened." The doctor demanded in a hushed tone that said he feared for his own sanity along with the fact that he feared that just admitting that he saw what he saw was going to cost him his career.

"We saw." Dean replied all too cooly. "Now can you explain what just happened?"

"How am I suppossed to explain that?.. You said you saw it to.. The cuts just formed out of thin air!" The doctor hissed in a bewildered tone. Just then another slice appeared on the left corner of Sam's forhead, then another and soon "11,958" was carved into Sam's left temple as the next slices formed on Sam's left forearm again to form "14,387".

"Dear Lord they're numbers!" The doctor exclaimed to more to himself than anyone else, in fact the doctor had seemed to forget that anyone else was in the room besides him and Sam because he was in shock from seeing what not every rational mind can explain unless that rational mind knew about the existence of all the very real things in the world.

"Any idea what they could mean?" Dean asked sternly as he looked around the room waiting for anyone to offer an explanation.

Everyone shook their heads "No." because all of them honestly had no clue.

More slices began to form on Sam's right forearm and Garth noticed how Sam's face made a grimace of pain. "Is he in pain?" Garth asked.

"Well research shows that coma patients do react to pain stimuli." The doctor replied.

"So my brother's feeling all of this?" Dean growled.

Just then blood began to seep through Sam's hospital gown above Sam's chest.

Dean pulled the fabric of the hospital down to reveal more slices on the center of Sam's chest. After several agonizing slices into Sam's skin the number "135,764,389,474" finally formed on the space in the center of Sam's chest.

And as those slices formed numbers even more slices began to form on Sam's right forearm until the number "192" was carved into the flesh on Sam's right forearm.

The doctor who had already paled so much that he was whiter than a piece of white copy paper looked like he was on the verge of passing out. But he still moved with purpose to try to stop the bleeding of all the wounds that had formed and that were continuing to form as well as the ones that were continuously appearing at random. Each time a slice formed in a new area the carvings would continue until a ledgible number was sliced into that area of Sam's skin, while others sporatically formed in other locations on Sam's body and those slices would also continue until numbers were carved into those spaces.

"634,977,986" was carved into the space of skin on Sam's bottom lip. While "3,247" was carved into Sam's right temple.

Just as new slices where being formed in the flesh of the areas of Sam's left Pectoral Muscle and on the flesh in the middle of Sam's forehead, Garth's phone started to ring. Dean shot Garth a murderous scowl and Garth took that as a cue that he had better leave the room because Dean hated his ring tones at the best of times and right now Bobby Brown's "My Perogative." was going to get him killed. But it was an important call that Garth had to take while in Dean's pressence because that particular ring tone meant that one of the local hospitals was calling "Marshall Baxter" about one of the coma patients that had survived an attack by the spirit and Dean would need to know what was going on.

"You're saying that someone has been attacking Ms. Trunestead? How so?" Garth asked. Now his conversation had Dean's, Benny's and Castiel's attention

"Someone's cut her up?" Garth repeated what he heard to the others as he gave them a face of bewilderment. "They carved numbers all over her skin?" Now Dean was marching at Garth with intent. Dean snatched the phone from Garth and growled out "This is Marshall Taylor, I'm working on this case with Marshall Baxter and I want you to tell me everything you know, right now."...

By the time the sun rose the following morning Garth had recieved sixteen more calls all saying the same thing about some of the other coma patients and unfortunately four of those calls had informed him that some of the coma patients had died. Also Sam's skin had new numbers carved in various places by the time the sun rose and that plus all the new information on most of the coma patients that had survived an attack by the spirit had Dean in a rage filled panic.

"We need to figure out what all the people that the spirit has attacked have in common." Dean demanded. "Garth you go to all the hospitals the victims are in. I want you to talk to their families, their friends, everyone you can find that even knows the victims. Benny I want you to use some of your thieving skills to get a look at all of the victims' medical records and see if any of them are conected that way. Cas I need you to stay with me and see if you can help with healing any of the things that are wrong with Sam."

Benny and Garth both nodded and left the room to go do as they were told and Cas went to Sam's side and started trying to heal Sam's various ailments.

"I can't heal any of it." Cas stated with sorrow. "There's nothing I can do."

Dean was about to demand that Cas keep trying until Sam was back to a hundred percent when suddenly his phone rang.

"Dean, I just got a call. One of the surivors is awake." Said Garth in an relieved tone. "Maybe that means that Sam will be okay to."

"Is the survivor who woke up one of the ones that has numbers carved into their skin?" Dean asked.

"Yeah and from what I understand she told her doctor that she knew what they meant but she wouldn't tell him what they meant or how she knew because she was afraid he wouldn't believe her."

"You go talk to all the people who know the victims like I asked you to. I'm gonna go talk to the vic that just woke up. Which one of them is she?" Dean asked.

" ." Garth replied. "She's in the Fairlake Memorial Hospital room five-o-two."

"Got it." Dean said as he jotted down the information. "Cas I need you to stay with Sam. Don't let anyone but his doctor in the room, we don't need too many questions and call me if there's any change in his condition or if more carvings start forming."

"Sammy." Dean said in a soothing voice as he placed his hand on Sam's right cheek because so far it was the only spot on Sam's face that hadn't been carved into. "I just want you to know that I.. I.."

"I gotta go try to figure out why the spirit targeted you so I can figure out how to help you come out of this coma and as soon as.. There's a lot of things I need to tell you when you wake up Sammy. Some of them are things I should have said a long time ago and one of them is something that I never should have stopped saying."

"I'll be back Sammy. So please don't.. Don't go anywhere. Okay kiddo?" Dean whipered. Then he gave Cas a look and said "Don't let him out of your sight.".

After Cas said he wouldn't leave Sam's side for anything Dean exited Sam's room and headed for the parking lot. He hoped like hell that this Ms. Trunestead lady really had the answers he needed because Sam's life might literally depend on it...

~0~

Upon arriving at the visitor's desk at the Fairlake Memorial Hospital Dean flashed his U.S. Marshall's badge then he headed for Ms. Trunestead's room.

When he was just around the corner from her room he heard the obviously irritated voice of a woman saying "I already told you people that I can't remember anything."

Not only did that feminine voice sound irritated, but it sounded very european and very familiar..

"You have got to be joking." Both Dean and the woman laying in the hospital bed said in unison as Dean entered the room.

"U.S. Marshall boys. I need a word with." Dean gave the woman in the hospital bed a wrathful snear as he growled out "Ms. Trunestead.. In private."

The local police that had been there to question the woman who laid in the bed gave simultaneous groans of defeat as they left the room and shut the door behind them.

"Alright Bella." Dean snarled "You better start talking or so help me.."

"Go away Dean. It's none of your business." Bella stated somberly as she turned to face away from him.

"Oh you better believe that it's my business. Why aren't you on a rack, roasting somewhere in the flames of Hell where you belong?"

"I never went to Hell. Apparently I never even really made a legitament deal.. I was tricked into believing that I had so that those bastards could use me. They needed a human to do the things they couldn't and I was the perfect sap. The night my deal would have come due I found I'd been given a second chance at life."

"Yeah right..I'm not buying it and second chance or not I will start ripping you to pieces like the Hellhounds should've if you don't start talking. What ever you've gotten mixed into this time has put my brother in the hospital. He's in a coma because of you."

"You think all this is happening because of me?" Bella asked incredeously.

"Hell yes I do. Sam is in a coma like every other person who survived an attack by this spirit. He's even got numbers carved into different spots of his skin like some of the other survivors. So you better tell me what's going on. What'd you do Bella, mess with some kind of cursed object this time? Cause whatever you did set a pissed off spirit lose and it's hurt and killed several innocent people."

"I didn't do this. I haven't messed with anything from the supernatural realm ever since I got a second chance."

"You can quit it with the second chance crap."

"It's true Dean. And I swear the second I realized my life was my own again I started turning things around in my life. I'm no longer a thief, I no longer mess with things I never had any business messing with I'm a completely.."

"If you say that you're a completely different person so help me I will start beating the living hell out of you." Dean snarled.

"Go ahead." Bella said in a challenging voice "I'm sorry about what's happened to Sam, but I'm not going to help you and if that means you'll kill me then do it."

"Still the same cold bitch you always were." Dean stated venomously.

Bella gave a sigh and said "It's just you won't.. You wouldn't believe anything I can tell you anyway."

"That's for damn sure. But right now you're the only survivor to wake up. So talk."

"First off. From what I know each number is a number of times that something happened to a person and where it's carved... It's hard to explain.. There's things I'd have to tell you that I'm not comfortable with anyone knowing about me.. But it's the only way I can make it make any sense."

"Well I haven't got all day. My brother could die because of this thing!" Dean snarled out through clenched teeth. "So whatever issues you've got, you better get over them and tell me what I need to know! NOW!"

Bella gave a nod and Dean could see the tears start to form in her eyes but he wasn't moved. He knew Bella was a viperous bitch that could turn on the crocodile tears whenever she wanted. She drew in a shaky breath and began to speak.

"I could feel the slices forming on my flesh. There was a voice in my head that told me what each number meant as it was carved. It told me the story behind the numbers. Each was a story I already knew. The first cuts where made on my left thigh." Bella pushed the cover down and pulled her hospital gown to the side to reveal the number "13,145" carved into her left thigh.

"This is the number of times I was raped before I turned eighteen." Bella stated sounding numb as she hid her face in her hands.

"When I argued that there was no possible way it could have happened so many times the voice told me that everyday since I was six up until I turned fourteen really added up and that since my father let three of his friends join the fun on most days sometimes making it a total of at least four times a day and that's when they all only felt like using me once a piece.. Well it really added up... This." Bella said with a shuddering cry as she rolled enough to show Dean the back of her left thigh where the number "11,897" was carved "Is how many times they sodomized me."

Dean couldn't see her face but he could hear the tears in her voice and he knew her tears were genuine and that she was telling the truth.

"This." Bella held a hand to her left cheek where the number "8,768" was carved "Is the number of times my father hit me.. I was hit by him up to four times a day.. Most of the times he hit me was because I always tried to fight back when he and his friends.. And this.." She rubbed her right cheek where the number "3" was carved "Is how many times my mother hit me.. She slapped me and called me a lying whore every time I tried to tell her what my father was doing..."

"After the last time she hit me I shut down and stopped trying to tell her. That night my father came to me alone and.. He never stopped no matter how much I fought or begged or cried.. I couldn't take anymore.."

"The next day after school I stopped at the park that was on my way home.. I sat on the swing and decided that I would never go back home.. I was going to run away and then out of nowhere there's suddenly this little girl who's sitting on the swing next to me. And she tells me she can take care of it for me. I thought she was sent by GOD.. I thought she was an angel sent to save me even when her eyes flashed red I thought she was only there to help. I thought she was only going to make my father stop, or make my mother believe me, so I said yes and she gave me this evil smile that said she was nothing but cruel and suddenly I didn't think she was so benevolent anymore. I felt very afraid and ran home."

"The very next day both my parents died and so did all three men who.. And as relieved as I was to not have to live like that anymore I knew that my family was dead because of me.. I never wanted them to die.. I just wanted it to stop.. I began to hate myself because I was the reason they were dead and I tried telling anyone who would listen how their deaths were my fault, but no one understood..."

"I got sent away for a few years because everyone thought I was crazy... But I knew that I wasn't crazy.. That little girl really did come to me in the park and I somehow knew that it wasn't really a little girl.. She wasn't.. I knew she wasn't human.."

"When I turned eighteen I was released from the home for troubled youths that I'd been sent to live in. Then I received my inheritence. I could've done anything I wanted with my life but that money felt tainted with my mother's and father's blood so I only used what I absolutely needed to stay alive at first. I did as much research as possible trying to figure out what sort of being had come to me when I was a child.. I ended up figuring out that it had been a Crossroads Demon and so I started thinking that I had inadvertantly sold my soul.. And as much as I felt I deserved to be punished for what I had done I didn't want to have to go to Hell.. And then I realized I only had six years to figure a way out so I started doing everything in my power to appease the Crossroads Demon who had made the deal for a chance to barter back my soul only to find that Crossroads Demon that had made the deal with me wouldn't be the one to own my contract."

"The night my deal would have come due I heard a Hellhound baying.. I'd been hallucinating and everything.. So I thought surely I was about to be ripped to shreads when the clock struck Midnight. Then a Hellhound burst into my room, but it made no move to kill me. Suddenly this short, round fellow appears behind the Hellhound and tells me that a mistake was made and that my contract was Null and Void.. My soul was my own again. I asked how. He said that even demons had rules and there are very clear rules that they're not allowed to make deals with anyone under the age of consent. Then he told me that since I'd never kissed the demon I'd never sealed the pact anyway, so even if I had been over eighteen the deal still wouldn't have been legitament... I realized how lucky I was and turned over a new leaf after that. I've been trying to live under the radar ever since.. And now this." She cried.

"This." She whispered as she placed a hand to the bend on the right side of her neck where another number was carved "Is all the times I've felt guilty about the things I've done."

Dean gave a stiff nod of understanding. He wanted to be sympathetic.. But Sam was the sensitive one. Sam was the one who was better at these sorts of things. Dean was almost always at a loss when it came to trying to help others through their pain.

"What about the other numbers?" Dean asked reluctantly. Suddenly he didn't want to cause her any more pain.

"This is how many times I was neglected." Bella replied as she put her hand to her left temple where the number "17,685" was carved into her skin "I guess that since I was being raped everyday, sometimes several times a day and the damage it did was never taken care of, plus the fact my mother didn't listen and no one ever cared to hear what I had to say after my mom and dad died all counted as times I was neglected... And this.." She pointed to her right temple "Is how many times I was abandoned by my family."

"This." Bella put her hand to the center of her chest "Is how many times I've had my heart broken... And this.." Bella pulled her hospital gown over to reveal her right thigh "Is how many times I was raped after I turned eighteen.. And the number on my top lip is how many times... It's how many times I was orally raped as a child.." She said with a humiliated whine as she burried her face in her hands again. "And the number on my bottom lip is how many times.. After I turned eighteen." She sobbed.

"There's another number on my chest here." Bella said as she placed a hand to her right breast. "It's how many secrets I used to have... But now I've told you most of them. So they're no longer secrets."

"What about the numbers on your arms?"

"The number on my left arm is how many times I thought about suicide while the number on my right is the one time I was successful.. I was ten and had just tried to tell my mom what was happening for a second time and when she hit me I.. I.. It actually hurt me worse than anything that my father could ever do to me.. I took a few handfuls of some of my mom's Valium and took like six drinks of my dad's whiskey to make sure it was done right... While the doctors worked to try to save my life, my heart gave out and stopped beating, they couldn't get it beating again for seven whole minutes.. So I guess technically I was dead.. The number on my right bicep is how many times I only got as far as an attempted suicide."

Bella wept as she continued "The number on the center of my forehead is how many things that are wrong with me because of all the things that have happened to me throughout my life."

"What sorts of things?" Dean asked as he tried to keep his own tears from falling. Yes, once upon a time he had REALLY, HATED Bella.. Well okay.. Once upon like fifteen minutes ago he had still really hated her, but now that he knew even just part of her story he understood why she had become the way she had been almost five years ago and he couldn't bring himself to hate her anymore.

"I have Post Traumatic Stress Disorder and Depression."

"That's two things. You have the number nine hundred fifty-two carved into the center of your forhead."

"I don't think there's classifications to diagnose all the ways my mind and spirit are broken because of all the things that happened to me." Bella replied with a shaky sob.

"I felt every cut and every time the voice spoke and made me remember what each number represented I felt the pain of everything that ever happened as if it was happening all over again.. It made me feel it all even more intensely than when it happened, all the pain.. All the guilt, the loneliness, the heartbreak, the sadness.. All of the despair."

"I've told you everything I know. Now please.. Just leave me alone." She whimpered and Dean could hear the frightened little girl that still hid inside her crying out for her father to leave her alone and he felt angry for all the ways she had suffered.

Dean swallowed the lump in his throat then he gave a stiff nod as he turned to leave the room. The second he was out in the parking lot he knelt down next to his beloved Impala and vomited out all of the contents of his stomach as it hit him what some of the numbers that were carved into Sam's flesh might mean...

He needed to know and he wanted to know now. So he broke the speed limit driving back the hospital Sam was in.

~0~

Luckily a speeding Impala hadn't been enough to attract the attention of the local police and Dean raced to Sam's room to find Castiel exactly the way he had left him. Apparently the angel had taken not letting Sam out of his sight very seriously as Cas was staring at Sam without even blinking and honestly Dean found it a little creepy.

Just as Dean entered the room Sam made a face that said he was in pain again and Dean started to search for new cuts in Sam's skin. This time the cuts were forming in the middle of Sam's forehead to complete the number "279,864,389,574"

"Oh god." Dean cried in a shaky breath. "How the hell are all these numbers so high?"

Dean looked at the number on Sam's bottom lip and remembered what the numbers on Bella's bottom lip had represented and suddenly he felt like he was going to vomit again. Just then Sam made another pained face and Dean looked for where any new cuts might be forming only to see blood start running from under Sam's lower half.

"No." Dean stated in stern denial. "No.. Not you Sammy.. Please god tell me you haven't ever been.."

Dean clenched his fist and let out an angry cry as he pulled back the blanket. He rolled Sam jus enough to get a look at the back of Sam's left thigh to see the number "2" carved into the back of Sam's thigh.

"NO!" Dean wailed "God please no not this."

"Dean what is it?" Castiel asked.

Dean couldn't answer because he felt like he was about to hyperventilate because as he cleaned the cut on the back of Sam's left thigh more cuts began to form on the FRONT of Sam's left thigh until the number "4" was formed and now Dean was ready to go berserk as another cut began to form on Sam's top lip.

"I need to know if Sam was ever.. Do you know if he was ever?.. I mean you took all of his crazy away so you had to have seen some of the things that were in his mind.. So can you tell me if he's ever been?.." Dean choked out the words "Do you know if Sam's ever been raped?"

Everyone knew that when it came to expressions that Castiel didn't have many, but now the angel bore a clearly shocked expression as he said "I thought it was something that people weren't supposed to talk about."

Dean visibly deflated, then sunk to the floor and began to cry until his body was wracked by sobs. "Tell me Cas. Tell me everything you know. I need to know."

"Everything I saw was from Sam's time in The Cage.. Dean there is no way that you could even begin to comprehend the magnitude of everything that.."

"Tell me." Dean growled.

"Please understand.. I only caught glimpses.. I don't even know the full extent..."

"TELL ME!" Dean commanded. "Tell me everything you can.. Just please tell me." Dean cried in a whisper.

"I only know that Lucifer and four other Princes of Hell split Sam into several thousands of multiple selves and that they violated several of those multiples of Sam in unspeakable ways numerous times. I also know that Michael tried to keep every part of Sam as safe as possible, but The Cage is infinite and it's Lucifer's domain so Michael continuously failed to keep any part of Sam away from them."

As Castiel spoke more blood began to form on the bed.

"Dean he's bleeding again." Cas stated worriedly.

Dean was on his feet and by Sam's side in a flash. The blood was coming from under Sam's right leg so Dean rolled Sam enough to see the back of Sam's right thigh where the number "1,267,953,871" was carved into Sam's flesh. And just as Dean finished cleaning those cuts more appered on Sam's top lip to reveal the number "2" and Dean ran to the bathroom. He barely made it to the toilet in time to release the bile and stomach acid that was being expelled from an otherwise empty stomach.

"Dean." Cas beckonned from the room.

"No." Dean groaned.

"I can't.. I can't." He panted in a breathless plea. "I don't know how to deal with something like this."

"Dean." Castiel said in a commanding tone "Sam needs you. Right NOW."

Despite the fact that his head was spinning and he felt weak in the knees Dean struggled to a stand. If he felt like this from just knowing about only SOME of the things that Sam had gone through then he could only imagine how Sam was feeling right now. Thinking about how Sam might be feeling only made Dean feel even worse because Sam had obviously been through so much and Dean couldn't even begin to fathom what having gone through things like that might have done to Sam's mind, body and soul.

Much to Dean's relief there were no new cuts yet. But Sam looked distressed as he hoarsely cried out for Dean in a voice that couldn't get any louder than a raspy whisper.

"Sammy?" Dean pleaded and he hoped his voice could break through the depths of Sam's unconsciousness so that Sam could find his way out of the darkness. "Sammy I'm here. I'm not gonna leave you."

Sam made one more fruitless attempt at rousing but then he was forced to surccome to oblivion once again.

"What am I supposed to do?" Dean asked in a shaky voice "How do I help you Sammy?"

More blood began to seep through the fabric of Sam's hospital gown in the area of Sam's chest and even more blood came from the front of Sam's right thigh.

"STOP HURTING MY BROTHER YOU BASTARD!" Dean shouted at the seemingly empty air that surrounded Sam.

Dean felt so helpless as he watched more blood spring from the back of Sam's left hand as more slices appeared simultaneously with the ones that were completing the number "1,762,953,842" on the front of Sam's right thigh.

"Bella didn't have any numbers on her hand." Dean whispered sounding frustrated as he clenched his fists. "What the hell could these mean?"

Dean's phone started ringing and when Dean pulled it from his pocket Benny's number appeared on the caller I.D..

"What'd you find on your end?" Dean asked the second he answered his phone.

"So far every survivor whose records I've checked all have had some kind of mental illness like anxiety disorders, Depression.."

"Post Traumatic Stress Disorder?" Dean interupted.

"Yeah. That and ten out of the sixteen I've checked out so far had some kind of problems with substance abuse that derived from one or another of their mental illnesses.

"Substance abuse?" Dean asked. Suddenly he had an idea what the number that was beginning to form on Sam's left hand might mean. "I need you to call Garth and find out if any of the survivors with substance abuse has numbers carved into their left hands."

The number "3" finished forming on Sam's left hand and Dean started doing the math in his head if it did represent what he thought it did then maybe it wasn't how many times that Sam had drank demon blood because he knew for a fact of at least four times that Sam had drank demon blood. So maybe it was the number of things Sam had become addicted two?.. Dean did the math well demon blood was one and Sam had once admitted to having a drinking problem.. So what was the last thing that Sam had become addicted to?

"After you do that." Dean continued "I need you to compair the numbers on their left hands with the number of substances they've abused or how many addictions they've had. If you can."

"Got it. So I take it ya have a theory on what the numbers mean." Benny stated.

"Well for now a theory is all it is. I need to know everything I can about all the victims before I can know it's more than that. For now I want you and Garth to comb through EVERY victim's past and poke around for any hints that any of the people the spirit has attacked suffered any kind of abuse as children. I also need you both to find out if any of the victims ever made any aligations of being sexually assualted.."

"Whoa.. Hold on.. Are you saying that Sam's been?.."

"Like I said all I have for now is a theory. But the one victim to wake up said that's what some of the numbers represented for her and it's a lead.. So we have to follow it. Just.. Just find out if any of the other victims have any other things in common. Also I need for Garth to make sure he documents the numbers that are carved into the flesh of all the other victims and each of their locations so that I can compair the numbers with what you both find out about them using the info "Ms Trunestead" gave me. Also another thing to look for.. I want you to see if you can find out if any of the victims were ever suicidal."

"Alright brother I'm on it." Benny stated as he hung up.

According to the number that had just been carved on Sam's right pectoral muscle Sam had a lot of secrets.. Well over a few billion in fact if the carvings in Sam's flesh and where it was located meant the same thing for Sam as it had for Bella.

"Most of this has to be from The Cage." Dean whispered sorrowfully as he tenderly cleaned and bandaged the cuts "It has to be.. But what about what isn't Sam?.. What are those secrets?.. If some of the numbers mean what I think they mean..." Dean wiped the tears from his eyes as he cut away the bandage from Sam's left thigh so that he could change the dressing. He grimaced as he looked at the number four that was carved into the front of Sam's left thigh and then his body shuddered with anger as he thought about what the numbers on the back and on the front of Sam's left thigh possibly meant.

"Sammy." He whispered imploringly "Sammy if these numbers mean what I think they mean.. I need to know.. I need to know when it happened.. I need to know who it was.."

After he redressed the cuts on both sides of Sam's left thigh Dean started to methodically remove the bandage from the ones on Sam's left cheek so that he could put a fresh bandage there as well.

The number two that was carved there really pissed him off and he growled out "And this Sam. Did dad really hit you?" His growl ebbed out into a sob as he whispered in a whining cry "Why didn't you tell me Sammy?"

Cas placed a comforting hand on Dean's shoulder. Dean pulled away and rounded on Castiel giving the angel a murderous glare as he shoved Cas back until Cas was against the wall then he got in the angel's face and snarled "Did you know about what my father did?"

"Dean I don't know what you're.."

"You don't know what I'm talking about?.. Cas when you shifted whatever you shifted when you took away Sam's hallucinations of Lucifer you had to have seen more than just a few glimpses of the stuff from The Cage.. Was any of it.. Any of it at all possibly from Sam's childhood?"

"No Dean.. I already told you as much as I could about what very few things I saw when I shifted what would have been blocked off by the wall DEATH built.."

"But you're a friggin angel!"

"Dean we've had this discussion before. Just because I'm an angel doesn't mean I'm all seeing or all knowing."

"You can take me back in time. We'll go back to when Sam was born and go day by day until I find out everything I need to know."

"Dean there's no way you'll be able to get close enough to Sam to find out anything."

"Then get me inside his mind. I'll find out that way."

"It's not safe."

"You took Sam into Fred's mind."

"But Fred was only catatonic. He wasn't in a coma like Sam."

"Damn it Cas!" Dean bellowed. "Is there anything you can do?"

"De?.." Came a hoarse whisper from the bed.

Dean immediately rushed back to Sam's side. Sam was still unconscious but he was clearly distressed by the expression on his face. "Sammy?" Dean implored beggingly.

"Sammy please wake up."

"De?.." Sam whispered again and then Sam began to take in sharp hurried breaths as if he were panicking.

"Sammy it's okay I'm here. I'm right here. Please open your eyes."

"De!" Sam whined out sounding like he was in pain then he began to thrash around as if he were having some sort of seizure. The monitors began to blare as Sam's heart rate skyrocketed and his oxygen levels began to plummet...

~0~

It was touch and go for a while. Sam had flatlined four times making Dean's already frayed nerves finally break apart.

He was beginning to get jumpy and aggressive.. Well more than he usually was. And this horrible ache had settled into his bones from the way he kept himself so ridgid.. But he had to be ready to spring into action for if Sam cried out for him again.

Cas had tried to get Dean to go get some much needed rest with a promise to call if there were any changes with Sam. But Dean had refused and now it had been sixty-two hours since Sam had last uttered a noise and Dean hadn't slept a wink and Sam hadn't showed any other signs of waking. In fact it seemed like Sam was in even worse shape as even more numbers had been carved into various areas on Sam's skin.. Benny and Garth were beggining to whisper amongst themselves about the actions that would need to be taken with Dean should Sam be amongst the victims to not survive whatever it was the spirit was doing now as three more victims had died without ever coming out of their comas and two of them had numbers carved into their skin like Sam.

If Dean heard Garth's and Benny's plans about putting him on suicide watch if Sam died he made no mention of it. Which means that he most likely hadn't heard them because they were both still alive after even implying that Sam might not make it.

Of course Dean had laser focused on Sam so he wasn't very aware of much of anything that was going on around him.

It was like a lightning strike.. So fast if Dean hadn't been staring unblinkingly at Sam's face he would have missed it.

"Sam." Dean huffed out in relief as Sam's eyes shot open. But Sam made no other move than that.. And his vacant stare was focused on the ceiling. "Sam?" Dean asked worriedly.

Then Sam's eyes closed again.

"No. No. No. No... Sam.. Open your eyes again kiddo.. Look at me.. Sammy open your eyes." Dean pleaded.

Nothing.

"Damn it Sam! I'm begginging you to please open your eyes and look at me!" Dean sobbed out shakily.

"Do you want me to say it right now? Huh?.. Before you're even awake to hear it?"

"I'm sorry Sam. Okay? I'm so sorry I was such an asshole to you. I get it now. I get why you didn't look for me while I was in Purgatory. To be honest I always got it.. I was just.. I just wanted someone to be pissed at about every screwed up thing in my life and you were an easy target."

"De?" Sam whispered and this time Sam's eyes rolled a few times behind his eyelids as Sam groaned and his head started to weakly roll side to side. "De?" Sam groaned out.

Sam's mouth started to open and shut and Sam made a harsh swallowing noise, then his head listed forward and his eyes opened again. This time he looked around the room blinking blearily as he called out in a tired pant "De?"

"I'm right here Sammy" Dean replied as he reached for a glass of water that Garth had brought him.

Dean placed the straw of the cup to Sam's lips and Sam began to drink greedily. "Easy kiddo. Not to much at once you'll make yourself sick." Dean chided in friendly reprimand as he pulled the cup away.

Sam gave a displeased noise and his head fell further forward as he tried to follow the straw as it left him. Dean placed a gentle hand to Sam's right cheek as it was still the only space on Sam's face with out a mark on it, which made sense because their mother had never hit Sam and gently whispered. "Come on Sam lay back before you hurt your neck."

Sam's head rolled back in attempt to comply but Sam was like a newborn as his neck seemingly wasn't strong enough to hold Sam's head up.

The wild and confused look in Sam's eyes worried Dean.. But it was Sam's weakened state that was really terrifying Sam's big brother.

"Okay.. Sammy.. Can you tell me where you are?"

"De." Sam groaned out in what seemed like annoyance as his head rolled forward again.

"Okay.. How about you just tell me how many fingers I'm holding up?" Dean asked as he held two fingers out for Sam.

Sam forced his head to roll somewhat to the side so that now his head was resting on his left shoulder at a very uncomfortable angle so that he could see Dean's face. This time he made eye contact with Dean.

"Hostipal." Sam slurred out sounding like he had bitten his tounge. "Two fwinguurs."

"I think I should go get the doctor." Garth stated worriedly, then he cringed as Dean shot him a disapproving glare.

"It's because of the pain medicine you moron!" Dean growled frustratedly.

"What's tause th pain medcine?" Sam asked as he gave Dean a look of innocent bewilderment.

"Nothing Sammy. You're alright now. Garth's just being a dumbass. Ya want some more water?"

"Yeah I turtsey." Sam slurred drunkidly.

"Okay but drink slow kiddo." Dean said lovingly.

"O..Tay De." Sam said with a yawn. Dean smiled as Sam's eyes started to droop. He pressed the straw to Sam's lips and Sam began to drink, but not as greedily as before.

"Good job Sammy." Dean said in joyus approval. "How about I go tell the doc that it's safe to cut back on the good stuff? What do ya say kiddo?"

"Good thuff?" Sam asked blearily.

Dean had an amused smile on his face as he pushed the call button.

"How may I help you." Came a chipper voice over the intercom.

"My brother just woke up and we'd like for the dose on his pain meds to be decreased cause they're making him a bit loopy." Dean replied and now he was full out grinning because Sam was awake..

"I'll let his doctor know he's awake and if he says that your brother's pain meds can be decreased then I'll send someone right down." The chipper voice replied.

"Thanks. Oh and could you call up some food for him to?" Dean aked.

"If his doctor says it's okay for him to eat I'll have a tray sent to his room."

"Awesome. Thanks so much."

"You're welcome. Have a nice day."

"You to." Dean replied before the intercom clicked off again.

When Dean sat back down Sam was giving him a huge smile.

"What?" Dean asked.

"Dude." Sam laughed out still sounding hoarse "Are you fwirrtting wif my nurswess?"

Dean let out a chuckle and shook his head grinning from ear to ear. He felt so relieved that Sam was awake and talking that he couldn't stop smiling.

"I wish I had a way of filming you right now. It would make perfect blackmail for later." Dean joked.

"Why ith my haiwr meth up'r stumthing?" Sam aked dazidly.

"Dude you were in a coma for five days! Of course your hair is messed up!" Dean exclaimed.

Sam raised his hands to feel his hair, then as he started to lay them back in his lap he noticed the bandages around both his arms.

"What wrong wif my arms? Was we in an acc..ss..ident?.. De? De wast anybody ewse hurt?"

"You don't remember what happened?" Garth asked worriedly.

"He'll start remembering once he gets all the pain meds out of his system."

"Membring what?.. De what happ..p.p.p..ened?"

"We were on a hunt and the ghost we were hunting started a fire. The roof caved in and one of the metal beams landed right on top of you." Dean bit out sternly.. All evidence of the lighthearted and happy mood that Dean had been in for a few brief moments after Sam's waking was all gone.

"Dean you have to.." Garth started to say "Tell him about the cuts."

"Not till after the meds are out of his system." Dean interupted. "If I tell him now he won't remember it later and I'll have to tell him all over again and I can't go through that twice."

"Go th..th..through what twice De?" Sam asked worriedly. "What..t. .ss wrong?"

"Sam I can't talk to you about it while you're like this."

"Did I do stumthing wrong?.. De did I mest up on th hunt?" Sam asked in confusion.

"No kiddo. It's nothing like that." Dean said soothingly as he carded a hand through Sam's hair. "It's just you're drugged up to your eyeballs with a pharmacy's worth of pain meds. Which is kind of my fault cause I kept threatening to cut the doctor into little bits if he didn't make sure that you weren't in any pain.. I just can't talk to you while you're all drugged up like this especially when in about three hours you won't even remember this conversation."

Sam didn't respond and when Dean pushed Sam's hair away from his face again he could see why. Sam was sound asleep.

"See. This is why it has to wait." Dean stated in a gentle and knowing tone as he laid Sam back against the pillows, then he made sure that Sam was in a comfortable position before he pulled the blankets back up to Sam's chest.

"What the hell were you thinking?" Dean growled out as he rounded on Garth.

"I was just worried about him because we still don't know how much the damage to his brain could be impairing him." Garth replied as he stood up straight and crossed his arms over his chest to show Dean that he wasn't intimidated nor should he be because he only had Sam's best intrest at heart.

"Fine." Dean said in frustration. "Just don't go freaking Sam out over all this stuff. He's already gonna be dealing with too much once the memories of whatever things the voice told him about each number starts to come back."

FIFTY-EIGHT HOURS AGO...

Garth had gone past Dean's expectations and had started photographing each cut as well as recording the interviews with each of the victims' friends and family members and when he did so he'd managed to capture some very interesting things..

He had caught what looked like an apparation in the act of clawing a number into a victim's skin with it's hideously long finger nails. And in one of the recordings he had caught an E.V.P. that had sounded like a young woman or older girl's voice saying "Liar. All lies." during an interview with one of the victims fathers when he'd asked about whether the victim he was aking about had ever been abused. And if Dean was right about what the numbers that had been carved into the left cheek of some of the victims' faces meant, then the man had indeed been knowingly lying when he'd told Garth "No." because that particular victim had the number fifty carved into his left cheek.

Three hours later Garth had been able to record an interview with another victim that had woke from their coma.

Mr. Stone had never been abused as a child and according to Mr. Stone's mostly clear face it was beginning to look like Dean's assumptions were right.

The only numbers that were carved into Mr. Stone's flesh were in the center of Mr. Stone's forehead, his left arm and the back of his right thigh.

Mr. Stone spoke of feeling the pain as each number was carved into him. And he spoke of how the voice had made him feel the pain of everything even more intense than when he'd first felt it. Then he spoke of the saddness.. The loneliness.. The despair...

To Garth's surprise Mr. Stone hadn't been the only one to wake up that morning. Another victim named Ms. Wittiker had also come out of her coma.

Ms. Wittiker was an elderly woman who bore numbers carved all over her face, legs, arms and chest. The only area she had numbers that Sam didn't was her stomache where the number nine was carved.

Her tale had been one of horrible childhood abuses. She had been raped and sodomized by her father and uncle every night from the time she had turned four until the day her father sold her to a man who turned her into a sex slave. She had only been ten at the time and she didn't get free from that torementer until she was over thirty years old and by then she had been forced to bear nine children that were fathered by that deranged bastard or one of his "clients" that had been allowed to use her and to this day she still didn't know what had become of those children because back then no one could help her and now no one cared to even listen when she tried to talk about what happened.

Garth made a solomn vow to help Ms. Wittiker find out what had happened to her children as he listened to her story of her brave struggle to make her way in the world as a thirty-three year old woman who could hardly speak and had no education what so ever. It had been a stroke of luck that a nun had found Ms. Wittiker and had thought her to be mentally ill. The nun then told a paritioner of her church who ran an asylumn about Ms. Wittiker and the paritioner had taken Ms. Wittiker into their asylum and gave her a name as she couldn't remember what her real name had been after having been called "Slut" for so long. And then through the asylumns many programs Ms. Wittiker had learned how to speak and how to read and write. Once she knew how to communicate she had told the people who ran the asylumn about what had been done to her and though they had cared there hadn't been anything they could do to help her because she didn't know the name of the man who had held her captive because he never allowed any of "his slaves" to call him or any of his "clients" anything but "Master".

Garth felt her pain as she wailed in agony about how much pain, lonliness, saddness and despair the voice had made her feel as she remembered and felt everything more intensely than when it had happened.

There were two more people that woke from their comas that very same day.

One was a man who had come from Florida for his vacation and he had numbers carved into the flesh on the back of his left hand, his right cheek, the center of his his chest, his left and right temples and the center of his forhead. Which meant that his family had neglected and abandonned him, his mother had slapped him, all of those things had broken his heart and caused him a mental illness which in turn lead him to develop an addiction to Heroin.

The other was a man who had been sodomized, orally raped and forcefully brought to several climaxes by his priest on numerous occasions when he was a boy. But other than the numbers on the front and back of that man's left thigh and the number on his top lip his flesh was clean.

Both men reported the same thing as the other victims to wake up.. A voice that made them remember what it had felt like to be in so much pain, how it had felt to feel so alone, how it had made them feel like they could never be happy again.. And both of them spoke of an overwhelming sense of despair...

Once Dean had heard that all of the coma patients had been in intense pain during all of the times the spirit carved the numbers into their flesh. And that they had all felt even more pain during all of the times "The voice" spoke because of how it made them remember and FEEL everything more intensely than when it happened. He had then threatened Sam's doctor with a painful death if Sam felt anymore pain and the doctor had ordered that Sam be drugged with the strongest non-dependence forming pain medicines that the hospital had to offer.

The next day word came that there was yet another coma patient to wake up and she had numbers carved in the flesh over her right breast, the front of her right thigh and the center of her forehead. Her name was Rebecca Parker, her boss had raped her and she'd never told anyone and now she had Depression and Post Traumatic Stress Disorder because of what had happened to her.

Another coma patient to wake up later that day was a man named Anthony McCtavesh who had numbers carved into his left cheek and right pectoral muscle because his dad had hit him several times as a boy and he'd kept it a secret.

Both Anthony and Rebecca also spoke of how the voice had intensified their feelings of pain, sadness, lonliness and despair as they were forced to remember the things that had happened to them in more vivid and intense detail than when those things had happened to them.

By the time the sun set that day yet another patient woke up.. He had numbers carved into the center of his forehead, the center of his chest, his left arm and the right side of his neck right in the juncture of his neck and right shoulder.. His name was Harry Warden and he'd been in an accident that had taken the lives of his wife and daughter and now he was suffering from Depression. The voice had made him think about all the guilt as well as all the sadness, lonliness and despair that he'd been feeling everyday since he'd lost his family. The poor man confessed to having had several thoughts about taking his own life because the heartbreak was sometimes too much to bear.

That night had brought the news of the deaths of three more victims and hearing that news had put Dean even more on edge as he kept vigile over his little brother.

~0~

When the cuts had started forming on Sam's skin again Dean had tried everything from iron and salt to banishing spells, none of it had worked to keep the spirit from carving numbers into Sam's skin.

All Dean could do was do his best to make sure that Sam felt as little pain as possible.

He'd gotten so desperate to keep Sam from feeling even an ounce of what had happened in The Cage. Because he believed if Sam had to feel over a hundred years worth of torture and according to Cas, rape all over again then Sam would surely die from pain alone were he to be made to feel it even more intensely than when he was there, that he told the doctor to go ahead and pump Sam as full of Morphine as possible even though it could make Sam form a dependency for it.

Yes, it made him feel like a total hypocrite to give the go ahead on giving Sam a possibly addictive substance especially knowing that since Sam had suffered from addictions in the past he was even more at risk for developing dependencies to other addictive substances. But Dean rather have Sam in the least amount of pain as possible for as long as possible and then deal with whatever complications that caused later, because it was better than letting Sam suffer or possibly even die from horrific amounts of pain that he should have never had to feel in the first place.

~0~

While Sam had been unconscious Dean had formed a habit of going over each number on Sam's skin over and over again. Each time he did so he'd think about what each one meant.

The intercom buzzed to life and the chipper voice returned saying "Mr. Taylor?

"Yeah." Dean replied into the speaker so that she could hear him.

"The doctor would like to come check on your brother before he gives the okay for any of his meds to be decreased or an okay on whether or not Sam can have anything to eat."

"Alright send him down."

"He'll be there in about ten minutes."

"Okay thanks."

"You're welcome." The chipper voice concluded before the intercom went silent again.

"Hehem.. We're gonna mosey on out a while so you can talk to the doc in private." Benny stated as he coraled Garth and Cas then started nudging them to the door.

"But.." Garth started to protest.

"Something like this should be for family only. If Sam and Dean want us to know any details the doctor gives them, they'll tell us." Benny replied in stern reprimand but it came out sounding almost soothing when said with his cajun drawl.

"Thanks." Dean said with a slight grin as he nodded in Benny's direction.

"Anytime brother."

Now that the others had given him some space for when the doctor came so that he could discuss Sam's condition in private Dean took a moment to just study his little brother while he slept. Dean lightly traced the numbers on Sam's right temple while whispering "I never thought.. Never once during all the times that I accused you of abandoning your family did I think about how you might have felt abandoned by us to.. I only thought about my own pain.. I never really thought about how much you might have been hurting because of us.."

Dean was startled from his revelry by a knock at the door.

"Damn ten minutes flies by fast." Dean groused with in a mumble before calling out "Come in."

"I hear Sam's awake." The doctor stated as he entered the room.

"Yeah. He woke up for a little bit but the pain meds pulled him back under." Dean gave a light chuckle as he said "The kid's always a lightweight when it comes to Morphine."

"Well he is on an extremly high dose." The doctor replied sounding slightly bitter. Apparently having his life threatened had rubbed him the wrong way.

"Yeah." Dean said looking guilty "I'm really sorry, I just didn't want him to be in any pain if I could prevent it. I mean you saw what was happening with the cuts."

The doctor seemed to soften a little as he said "Well I probably would've done the same thing if I were in your shoes."

"So how did he seem when he woke up?" The doctor asked.

"He seemed like he was really high." Dean replied sounding slightly amused.

"Was his speech alright?"

"Well he was hoarse and his speech was slurred a bit. But he had just woke up and he's on a lot of meds." Dean stated deffensively.

"Well.. While the pain medicines he's on might play a factor I'm still concerned that it may very well be an effect of the Stroke or the brain damage his scans revealed."

"What about his eyesight? Did he seem able to see alright?" The doctor asked as he started writing down the numbers from the machines at Sam's bedside and suddenly Dean was wondering if those machines were telling the doctor things that was making him ask such questions.

"He seemed to have a hard time focusing. But again he had just woke up and you said it yourself that the dose of Morphine he's on is extremely high."

"Hmm.." The doctor hummed in thought as he jotted down more numbers "Anything else that seems wrong with him that you think might just be the pain meds?" The doctor asked with a note of sarcasm.

Dean took a second to stare at the obscenely high number in the middle of Sam's forehead then blurtted out "His neck seemed really weak. And I'm afraid he might have some mental illnesses." because he wasn't going to risk Sam having something even just slightly wrong with his mind or body and it potentially go undiagnosed and untreated when there was something that could possibly be done about it to help Sam.

"Mental illnesses?" The doctor repeated sounding a bit taken aback.

"Yeah like Anxiety Disorders, Depression, Post Traumatic Stress Disorder, those sorts of things." Dean replied sounding defeated.

"Okay." The doctor said gently "For now I'll take Sam off the Morphine and make it to where he can get some real food in him and after about three hours I'll come back and see if Sam's eyesight and motor functions have made any improvement. Then we'll go from there."

Dean gave a nod and said "Yeah. I had a feeling that it'd take a few hours with him off the meds to know for sure. That's why I didn't.. Why I'd rather not jump to conclusion and start declaring my brother mentally impaired before he's even had a chance to prove everyone wrong."

The doctor gave Dean a kind smile then said "Maybe you're right.. Maybe Sam will prove to be stronger than anyone gives him credit for."

"Thanks doc." Dean said with a nod.

"Not a problem. Just keep believing in him and I'm sure he'll make a fast recovery." The doctor replied "After all if after seeing what I saw earlier wasn't a time to start believing that anything's possible then there never will be.. I'll be back this way in about three and a half to four hours. In the mean time you should try to get some rest cause I have a feeling that your brother's gonna be out for at least two hours."

"Thanks doc. I'll try." Dean said with a tired sigh as the doctor left the room.

The door didn't even have a chance to shut all the way as Garth appeared in the doorway. "Hey Dean?" he said with timid imploring. "I just saw the doctor leave. Is it alright if we come back in now?" Like the fact that he'd popped in the door the second the doctor had disappeared out of it wasn't evidence that he'd been hovering just outside the door the entire time.

"Actually do you think you guys could give me about two hours alone with Sam?" Dean asked without heat or sarcasm.

"Yeah. We can do that." Garth replied.

"Anything you want us to get while we're out?" Benny's voice asked from around the corner where Dean couldn't see him.

"Oh.. So Benny was hovering to.." Dean thought with a grin. Sam always did have a way of worming his way past someone's tough exterior and into their hearts.

"Um.. Yeah. The doc just said that Sam can have some real food and I don't count anything prepaired in a hospital as real food. So could you grab us some grub on your way back?"

"Sure. We'll see you in two hours." Benny replied. Then Dean heard Benny issue a not so subtle "C'mon Cas."

And by the shift in the atmosphear and the sound of rustling feathers it was evident that Cas had been doing WAY more than hovering.

"Wow. Way to give us some privacy." Dean said sternly as he fought to keep from laughing.

"Hey! I just noticed him gone. I swear." Benny stated innocently.

"Yeah. We did NOT put him up to that." Garth said sounding deffensive.

"Whatever. I just need two hours so if you guys have to put Cas in a ring of holy fire to keep him from eavesdropping on me then do it." Dean said with a tired chuckle.

"I can assure you that won't be necessary." Castiel stated in a thouroughly chastised voice from behind Garth. Cas still really needed to learn about sarcasm.

"Please go away so I can sleep." Dean replied with an annoyed groan.

"You heard the man." Benny said in a stern commanding tone and Garth stepped back and allowed the door to shut the rest of the way with him, Benny and Cas still on the other side.

After making sure the others were really gone he pulled the chair apart because it was the kind that made into a cot for the guests of the hospital patients. It was lumpy and uncomfortable. But no worse than over half of the hotel mattresses that he's slept on and within seconds Dean was out like a light.

~0~

When Dean woke up a little over two hours later Sam was still soundly asleep. He was about to call Benny and tell him that everybody could come back now when he saw that he had missed almost twenty calls from Garth.

At first he was annoyed that Garth was being so melodramatic then he listened to the messages on his voicemail. Garth had, had good reason to call. Apparently the spirit had changed things up again. Six more victims had died and this time four of them had been people to wake from their comas.

Suddenly the need to find out who this spirit had been in life so their bones could be salted and burned and the need to find out what object it was possessing to be able managing continuous, multiple and simultaneous attacks on it's victims so that the object could be destroyed was more urgent than ever before. Because once again, anyone the spirit had touched could be the next to die.. Including Sam..

~0~

Dean called Garth and and told him to start scouring the entire city limits building by building, person by person in search of answers as there still were no real connections between the victims other than what reliving some of the things they'd gone through in their lives had made them feel, that and both Bella and Sam kind of knew one another but that didn't seem to have anything to do with why the spirit had chose to attack them.

As Sam started to wake again Benny called saying he had possibly found a lead but that Dean wasn't going to like it because there was no way they were going to find all of the remains of a body in the city's expansive sewer system. Especially when the body had supposedly already been down there for at least nine years without having been "Officially" discovered.

According to Benny's source a sewer worker had seen the naked body of a girl who couldn't have been any older than sixteen under the surface of the water but when he'd tried to get to her, her body had disappeared.

Benny's source had also reported that the sewer worker had seen numbers carved into various places of the girl's skin that he could see. The source had said that the man had reported the body and that an army of police officers had scoured the sewers only to find no sign of a body. The sewer worker had subsequently suffered ridicule for spreading "a deluisional lie" that was all too common for "the weaker minded sewer workers" with "over active imaginations". Thus the man was not only traumatised by what he'd seen but humiliated by the fact that he was telling the truth yet everyone believed he was either crazy or a sick liar so he'd quit his job four days later and according to Benny's source there were several rumors about what had happened to the man after that and none of those rumors had given the man a happy ending.

Dean told Benny to follow the lead as far as it would take him then he hung up the phone and grabbed a glass of water as Sam finally opened his eyes again.

"Hey." Dean whispered as he held the straw steady for Sam.

Sam took a couple of long greedy drinks then he let his head fall back onto his pillow as he hoarsely whispered "Hey." in response.

"How you feelin?" Dean asked.

"Like I've been fed into a meat grinder." Sam groaned.

"Sam I know about the numbers and the voice.. Now I want to know what the voice said to you.. I want to know what the numbers mean for you."

"It doesn't matter." Sam replied.

"Like hell it doesn't." Dean growled.

"It doesn't matter Dean. It never has and I'm not going to argue about it. I'm not talking about any of it because if you already know about the voice and the numbers then you have just as much to go on as I do. So me talking about what I saw, heard or felt isn't going to help the case in any way."

"Whatever information you have could be what ends up cracking this case wide open."

"Of course. Nothing ever matters more than the case." Sam stated bitterly.

"More people could die if you don't tell me what you know."

"Dean. Right now someone's getting shot by someone else. Another person, possibly a world away from them is getting run over by a drunk driver. Nothing we do here is gonna save them. There isn't anything I can tell you that's gonna save any lives here or anywhere else in the world. So it's pointless."

"Why do you always have to be so selfish?" Dean snarled as he tried to keep from just begging Sam to tell him.

"Selfish?" Sam said with a bitterly sarcastic scoff "There's no information I can give that's gonna help this case and I'm not gonna.. I'm not talking about it and if that makes me selfish.. Then FINE." Sam bit out angrily.

Just then Sam gave a pained bellow as the number on the center of his chest changed to increase by two.

"SON OF A BITCH." Dean growled angrily as the number on Sam's right pectoral muscle began to change as well but it increased by double making Sam writhe and whimper in agony.

"I'm fine." Sam hissed when it was over.

"Fine?" Dean repeated incrediously as he pointed to the cuts on Sam's right pec. "Sam I know enough to know this number represents secrets."

"Then stop trying to get me to talk about this stuff or the number's only going to keep getting higher." Sam stated sounding frustrated.

"What?" Dean asked in surprise.

"I said stop. Just stop Dean. Just let it go."

"You're unbelievable. Un friggin believable Sam! You know this thing could kill you to if there's something you know that could help this case that you're not sharing right?"

"There isn't anything I know that could help this case."

"So you're fine with this thing killing you?" Dean swallowed the lump in his throat as soon as the words had left his mouth his eyes had shot to the bandages on Sam's forearms where the numbers for suicidal thoughts and successful attempts at suicide were carved.

"If I die. I die. There's not a lot that can be done about it. It's gonna happen sooner or later. If not now then maybe on some other case where a monster decides to gut me. There's no point in.."

"Sam, you're going to tell me what the hell every single one of these numbers mean and I don't care if you think there's no point because you don't get to decide what matters and what doesn't when it comes to something like this."

"Well if you wanna play it that way, then fine. Who gets to decide what matters and what doesn't Dean?.. You? Because if it's you then you've already decided a long time ago that it didn't matter, so there. According to you it doesn't matter."

"I never made a decission like that!" Dean bellowed.

"Oh.. You did.. It's not my fault you don't remember." Sam stated angrily "If there was info I had that could break this case open I'd share it but I don't have any and I'm not talking about all the crap you have no business knowing about."

"No business knowing about?! I'm your brother!"

"Yeah and last time I checked nothing about us being brothers means I have to tell you every detail about my life."

"You know what? I've had it Sam. You don't wanna tell me that's perfectly fine. But just so you know I do know exactly what the numbers on your thighs mean to."

Sam visibly paled as Dean revealed just how much he knew. He gave a stiff nod as he said "Like I said. If you know what the cuts mean then there really isn't anything I can tell you that'll help the case."

Dean threw his hands in the air as Sam's stubborness finally won out.

"Alright. You don't wanna talk? Fine. I'm done. I'm not gonna keep asking you to talk about this."

Just then there was a knock at the door.

"Come in." Dean called as Sam's voice was still to hoarse to be heard from that far away.

"Hello Mr. Taylor. I'm Doctor Hughes. How are you feeling now that you're awake again?" Sam's doctor asked as he entered the room.

"Awake again?" Sam asked sounding confused.

"Yes. You came to earlier but you weren't very coherent due to the intensely high dosage of pain meds we had to have you on." The doctor replied.

"Intensely high dosage of pain meds? What sorts of pain meds?"

"Morephine mostly."

"Isn't that a potentially dependence forming pain medicine?" Sam asked as he shot a glare at Dean.

"Well it's not exactly like you're sharing either." Dean stated through clenched teeth "YES. I know that you obviously have had addictions in the past and that, that puts you even more at risk for developing other addictions. But it was better than risking you having to relive over a hundred years worth of what ever happened to you in Hell."

Sam looked shocked that Dean had just talked about Hell. Real Hell and in front of a civilian. But even more surprising was that the civilian, a doctor at that, wasn't jumping to have Dean commited right then and there.

"The doc here's kind of up to speed on the kind of work we do." Dean replied as the look on Sam's face wasn't disappating.

"Yeah and after seeing what I saw I believe every word your brother has told me." The doctor said with a slight cringe.

Sam raised an eyebrow then tilted his head in understanding as he said "So I take it that you saw the spirit manifest itself? Cause that's what it usually takes for someone to believe even a little of what we tell them about our real lives."

"No. I didn't see the ghost.. Spirit.. Whatever you wanna call it. No I just watched as some of the cuts on your skin appeared out of thin air." Doctor Hughes replied.

Sam gave a sideways nod as the doctor continued with "So.. Really how are you feeling?"

"Things are still a little hazy. But mostly I feel only a little worse for wear."

"So you're in pain?" The doctor asked.

"Yeah a little."

"How bad? On a scale from one to ten."

"About an eight."

The doctor gave a look that said "That's more than "a little"." But he only wrote a few things down on the paper attatched to the clipboard in his hand then said "Well your motor functions seem markedly improved. So I'll wait for about another hour or so to make sure that you don't have any complications from the brain damage we found on your head scans. If all goes well I'll start you on the prescriptions you'll need to manage your heart condition and M.S. as well as your other injuries."

"Whoa. Brain damage?" Sam asked in disbelief. "Heart condition?.. M.S.?.. What other injuries?" As Sam was shocked to find that the doctor had actually had a chance to really look him over.. Usually Dean or some one else would have swooped in by then and yanked him out of the hospital even if he had been unconscious. Then he vaguely remembered Dean saying something about him having been in a coma for five days and suddenly he realized that he hadn't been just unconscious.

"Oh.. I thought your brother had a chance to go over the extent of all the things we found wrong with you." Doctor Hughes replied apologetically.

"No he hasn't really had a chance. All I know is I was in a coma." Sam lied because he didn't want Dean to know that he had already known for a couple of months about the M.S. and heart condition.

Sam tried not to let the pain show when the number on his right pectoral increased by four. But Dean caught it and was just about to say something when the doctor started talking to Sam again and interceded anything he might've said.

"Yes. You were in a coma but that wasn't even close to the worst that things got with you."

"Really?"

"Oh yes I must apologize. But I have to tell you. You suffered a Hemorrhagic Stroke which means that you had some blood vessels inside your brain rupture causing bleeding of the brain."

Sam raised his bandaged hands to his head to feel that his hair was still there and still in tact then asked "How did you manage to fix something like that with out cutting into my head?"

"I went with a minimally invasive shunt to drain the blood then I ran a microcam into the drainage tube, found the burst blood vessels and repaired them.."

"Sounds complicated." Sam replied.

"Well it's actually a lot easier and safer than open brain surgery especially in a case like yours. But there may still be complications from the Stroke and/or the brain damage, so if you notice anything that feels even just a little off, like feeling numbness in your face or limbs, if your speech starts to sound impaired or if you feel like anything's wrong with your motor functions or cognitivity at all you let someone know as soon as possible."

"Okay, I will. Is that everything?"

"Unfortunately no." Said the doctor.

"Sam you also had two massive heart attacks and your heart stopped several times. There were several moments that by regulations I should have called time of death but your brother was very clear on what would happen to me should I fail to get your heart beating again."

"So.. My heart.. Is it weaker now?"

"Substantially. Yes. And I'm afraid that it wasn't as strong as it should have been to begin with as you had a condition called Atrial Fibrillation. Which means that your heartbeat was irregular and now the condition has progressed to Cardiogenic Shock which means that you're very lucky to even be alive as most people don't survive more than twenty-four hours after being diagnosed with Cardiogenic Shock as there's usually already to much damage to the heart for the person to be saved."

"Am I going to need surgery to fix it?" Sam asked.

"Well there are ways to manage the condition with medcations as you survived past the normal twenty-four hour time frame. But I want to stress how dangerous it will be if anything else happens that could effect your heart. You're going to have to constently monitor your heart rate and blood pressure from now on and you'll have to take all the medications that will be prescribed exactly how they're prescribed. You'll never be able to afford missing even just one dose. I'd also like to get you on the transplant list..":

"Transplant?" Dean asked sounding worried "He needs a transplant? I thought you just said his condition could be managed with medications."

"Yes it can be managed with medications for a while... But you have to understand how much damage Sam's heart sustained.. He will eventually need surgery.. Quite possibly an implanted Defibrillator or a Pacemaker and yes.. He will even have to have a transplant eventually. The medications are only a temporary solution. That's why it's best to get him on the list as soon as possible espescially considering his other conditions."

"I'm still in the room people." Sam said sounding frustrated that he was being talked about like he wasn't there.

"My apologies Sam." Doctor Hughes replied "Of course all of the decisions lie with you."

"Put him on the list." Dean commanded in an angry tone as he stood from his chair besides Sam's bed.

"Did you not just hear the man? It's my choice... I'll take whatever medications you prescribe.."

"Damn straight." Dean interjected.

Sam ignored Dean as he continued with "But I don't want on the list."

"Like hell!.. Sam I'm not gonna sit by and wait for you to die. Your name's going on that list if I have to write it myself!" Dean shouted angrily.

"There are other people who need a heart more than I do. People who matter.. That are worth something.. Who deserve it more than I do." Sam stated numbly.

"Sam. Like you just said.. People all over the world are dying.. You sacrificing your one chance at getting a healthy heart isn't going to save those people."

"Dean I also said I'm going to die sooner or later. If not now then on some other hunt when some monster decides to gut me. All putting a new heart in my chest is going to do is waste a perfectly good heart that could have went to someone who deserves it more."

"God damn it Sam!" Dean yelled as he slammed his fist into the wall above Sam for emphasis. "Why are you doing this?"

"Why are you being such a hypocrite?!" Sam snapped back sounding fed up.

Dean looked shocked and incredeous as he silently mouthed the word "hypocrite", then he threw up his hands and snapped "Fine. .. You wanna just lay back and let nature take it's course. Okay Sam.. But don't come crying to me when something else happens to cause even more damage to your heart!" He instantly regreted his abilitly to always manage to say the wrong thing at the worst possible times as he watched Sam deflate. His little brother was already broken enough as it was without his help.

Sam gave a shrug that said that he hadn't ever planned to as he turned to the doctor and asked "So if everything goes as good as you're hoping how soon can I be out of here?"

"Mr. Taylor, it's far too soon to even be thinking about discharging you. I doubt you'll be well enough to leave for at least two, maybe three more weeks."

"Even if I promise to do everything that I'm supposed to once I'm home?"

"I'm sorry Sam but with the condition you're in, you'll be more prone to illnesses and infections and even just a case of the sniffles or an infected paper cut would most likely kill you right now."

"Look. I get that I do. But that doesn't really... Could you just write the prescriptions and let me sign out A.M.A?"

"Well legally I can't stop you from signing yourself out.."

"No. Hell no.. Sam there's no way you're leaving in this condition." Dean said sternly "It's practically suici.." He let his voice trail off as he looked at the bandages on Sam's forearms again. Now the meanings of what they represented were really sinking in.

"Sam. Why do you wanna kill yourself?" Dean asked in a gentle tone as he sat back down beside Sam.

Sam looked away as he said "It's not about killing myself.. I.. I just don't wanna live anymore ..."

"Why Sam?.. Why don't you wanna live anymore?" Dean implored in a shaky voice.

"It doesn't matter." Sam whispered sounding broken.

Dean tried to stay calm as he realised just how bad it really was. Sam wasn't really saying ""It" "doesn't" matter." he was actually saying ""I" "don't" matter.". Sam thought that HE didn't matter.

Dean took a deep breath and tried to keep it from sounding like he was snapping as he said "It matters Sam." and he hoped like hell that Sam could hear the underlying ""YOU" matter" in his words..

But no dice because Sam just rolled to his side so that he was facing away from Dean and whispered "There's no point.. There's no way of fixing things anymore."

It broke Dean's heart because he finally understood, because he had heard the unspoken "Between us.".. Sam didn't want to live anymore because he thought their tattered bond couldn't be repaired. Sam didn't want to live anymore because he thought that he no longer mattered to his big brother..

Just when Dean was about to contridict Sam's way of thinking.. Just when he was about to tell Sam how much he DID matter.. How much he was loved.. There was a staticy noise, the lights began to flicker and the temperature in the room dropped to freezing within seconds. Then Dean was picked up and thrown away from Sam's bedside by some unseen force.

Suddenly a spirit manefested itself..It looked to be the spirit of a girl no older than sixteen.. She was completely nude and she had numbers carved all over her flesh just like some of her victims. She seemed sad and remorseful as she reached out her hand to Sam..

Sam's monitors began to wail as Sam seized up and he passed out when she touched him, then his heart monitor gave a long drawn out squeel as Sam went into Cardiac Arrest once more...


	3. Chapter 3

Dean went numb as the heart monitor attached to Sam continued to wail despite the spirit having flickered out of sight and the swarm of medical personel trying to get Sam's heart beating again..

He was swept to another time, another place. He was watching as a team of doctors and nurses worked to save his dad all over again. Then he heard the words he'd been fearing.

"I'll call it. Time of death... Ten fourty-one a.m."...

"No." Dean whispered. "No. Not again. Not like this... Sammy please." He begged as the echo of the flashback died away to be replaced by the steady beaping of the heart monitor signaling that Sam's heart was beating again.

"We got rythm people." Announced one of the people surrounding Sam.

Dean suddenly felt light headed as relief flooded through him. "Oh god." he gasped "Oh thank god."

Eventually Sam was stable enough for the organized chaos buzzing around him to ebb off little by little and soon Dean found himself in the room alone with just Sam and Doctor Hughes all over again, it was almost like the last thirty minutes hadn't even happened.. Almost.

"What the hell can we do to keep that bitch away from my patient?" Doctor Hughes asked with a surly growl that oddly reminded Dean of Bobby when the old coot got over protective over either him or Sam.

The doctor didn't know that he'd just endeared himself to Dean for his protective nature concerning Sam. Dean shook his head and repressed a shudder as he said "I don't know."

The doctor gave Dean an apologetic look as he said "I'm afraid the next time she makes his heart stop that we won't be able to get it beating again."

Those words confirmed Dean's fears. He needed to find out how to get rid of the spirit attacking his brother and he needed to do it now...

As the doctor exited the room Dean went to Sam's bedside. Sam looked so frail that it terrified the hell out of Dean, his baby brother was understandably unconscious again and it made Dean feel so helpless that Sam was right there and there was so much that needed to be said, just in case.. Just in case he didn't have a chance to later.

He was about to open up and pour out his soul to his unconscious brother with a desperate hope that Sam could hear the really important things that needed to be said, things like "I love you, little brother.. Sammy, please don't die on me.", when he noticed the wet crimson beginning to seep through Sam's hospital gown, this time it was in two different places. One spot was on the right side of the collar of the gown and the other was over Sam's left pectoral muscle.

Dean took a shaky breath to try and suppress his rage as he pulled the blood stained collar away from Sam's neck.

The number representing all the times Sam had ever felt guilty was atronomically high. In fact it was the highest number carved into Sam's flesh so far. Dean pulled the left side of the gown aside so that he could see what other damage had been done. So far just another line had been carved into the skin over Sam's left pectoral and now what had once looked like a "backwards C" now looked more like a sideways teardrop and he wonderd just what the hell this symbol represented because so far Sam was the only one victimized by the spirit to have anything carved in that perticular area, plus there were no numbers that looked like what was carved into Dean's chest as far as Dean was aware. It was so frustrating because that symbol could be the entire answer, it might be a signature of some sort and the only people who knew anything about it was either unconscious or the evil bitch that had caused the cuts in the first place, which, yeah Dean was thinking of her as a person right now because he so badly wanted her to be corprial just so he could tear her to shreds for hurting his baby brother.

"Ugh.. That BITCH!" Dean growled as he bandaged the new slices carved into Sam's skin. "I'm gonna kill her. Sammy, I swear to you I'm gonna make her pay for hurting you."...

As soon as Dean was done bandaging the cuts, he carded a hand through Sam's bangs, then gave Sam one last look. He had so many emotions shining out through his gaze but the one that was the brightest and warmest was the one that told the world with just one look how much Sam Winchester was loved by his big brother as he said "You hang in there Sammy. I really don't want to leave your side. But I have to go, cause I've got work to do and when it's done that bitch won't be able to hurt you ever again." and then he turned and left before the over protective big brother in him made him cuff himself to Sam's bed.

As soon as he was out of the hospital he called Garth's and Benny's cell phones and told them that he needed them to start asking around about the unusual mark that was on Sam's left pectoral muscle then he headed for the place where The Rodagan Hotel once stood, the place where the most horrific parts of this nightmare began...

~0~

While Dean was on his way to the hotel Garth called to let him know that he couldn't find anything out about the strange mark over Sam's left pectoral muscle, but he did have a lead. As it turned out all the attacks by the spirit had been happening within a certain radius from the center of the downtown business district and it just so happened that a certain "Rodagan Hotel" was once the building nearest to the center of the downtown business district.. PLUS the Rodagan hotel was also right over where a majority of the city's sewer lines connected together.

"Well what d'ya know, I was just headed that way." Dean said with a sick sense of satisfaction, that ONE: Something had finally gone right in this case and TWO: He was a step closer to torching the bones of the evil bitch that had hurt his baby brother and right now he was hoping that when her bones burned, she'd feel the heat and the pain and that she'd know that she was suffering because she'd dared to hurt the person that Dean Winchester loves most in the world...

~0~

The lot where the hotel was once built was now cleared of rubble and it looked like a construction crew was already half a quarter through a rebuild.

"Boy, they don't waste anytime, do they?" Said one of the foremen in a friendly manner as he walked up to Dean and gestured at the building site.

Dean gave him a confused look.

"The owner is kind of in a hury to have the place rebuilt, something about how it's causing him to lose out on a few hundred thousand dollars for every week we take to finish rebuilding it. I'm guessing you're the building inspector?" Said the foreman as he passed Dean a hard hat.

Dean actually had a "badge" for "Building Inspector" in his massive array of badges and it'd be all to easy to play that card, but he'd already introduced himself to some of the hotel staff as "Marshal Taylor" and it'd blow his "cover" should anyone from the hotel staff, who might swing by to check on progress, address him as "Marshall Taylor" in front of the people that he could so easily introduce himself to as "Building Inspector Thomas".

"Actually, no. I'm a U.S. Marshall." Dean replied as he flashed his badge.

"Oh. Why are you here?" The foreman asked.

"Well almost a week ago me and a group of U.S. Marshalls were in the hotel that used to stand here and we were asking around about a string of deaths that looks to be the work of a serial killer and while we were here the hotel went up in flames and my partner was nearly killed. I'm here because I wanted to see if I could get any more leads."

"Well I know what's it's like to lose a partner. I uh.. I used to be on the force and my partner.. He.. Uh.. He died saving my life and after that I had a hard time moving on. I ended up getting kicked off the force because I turned to drinking and refused to get sober. So I understand man. I really do. But I think you'd find your leads better if you talked to the people who determined the cause of the fire."

"I know "what" caused the fire." Dean replied trying not to sound annoyed with someone who couldn't possibly understand the situation. "But I think that the deaths and the fire is all conected and that all of it had to do with where the Rodagan was built... Is there any plans for a basement?"

"No. We're builing over the basement that already exists. It's the only part of the builing that wasn't touched by the fire." The foreman replied. "What does that have to do with anything?"

"Because according to one of the U.S. Marshalls on this case, the Rodagan is built over where most of the sewer lines in the city connect. I think the killer has been using the Rodagan Hotel's basement to get into the sewers and using the sewer lines to get around the city. I need to search the basement." Which wasn't completely a lie. Dean really did believe the bitch was haunting the sewers and any place directly over a sewer line for a certain radius away from the Rodagan, because it was directly over the center. The body the sewer worker had seen nine years ago must have come to rest somewhere under the hotel and now she was able to attack a third of the city anytime something happened to piss her off. Something like all the new construction going on over the sewer lines in the downtown business district right now because of the fires she'd caused during her last tantrum.

Dean could now see things were only going to escalate. The spirit would get pissed about the construction over her resting place, then she'd cause fires, then there'd be more construction to repair the damage she caused, which would piss her off till she caused more fires and each time she got pissed enough to burn something she'd go after more people like Sam, Bella, Ms. Wittiker and all the other people she'd victimized so far...

"Well then I'll do whatever I can to help with your investigation. I just have to clear it with Conrad Lewis, he's the guy who owns the place." Said the foreman.

"I'll wait here." Dean said with a nod.

The foreman walked just out of earshot, then pulled out of cellphone and presumably called the owner of the area where the Rodagan once stood and by the looks of things the owner was bitching the foreman out for whatever reason because the foreman was looking more and more flustered by the second.

After he hung up the foreman started walking back over, he was walking slow and hanging his head and when he reached Dean he sounded thouroughly chastised as he said "He says to come back when you have a warrant. He also said and I quote "Tell the Marshall, good luck with getting a warrant when I'm friends with almost every judge in this city.".. I'm sorry but I'll lose my job if I let you get any closer to the building site."

Dean gave a curt nod as he said "Figures as much. Tell Mr. Conrad Lewis that his suspicious behavior just made him a prime suspect." then he turned to leave. Of course the second he had heard he'd have to have permission from the owner that it wouldn't be as simple as just flashing the badge of some kind of law inforcement, especially when dealing with some one who was rich, in Dean's experience, rich people always had something to hide from the law. It gave Dean a grim sense of satisfaction to think he might be making some snoby rich guy quake in his boots... The dude was momentarily getting in the way of him salting and burning the bones of the bitch that was trying to kill his brother after all..

Dean still wasn't going to let a possible lead slip through his fingers though, not when Sam's life was on the line, so he called Garth and asked him to have Kevin find out everything he could about the guy then he called Benny and asked him to find and discreetly follow Mr. Conrad Lewis... Just in case law inforcement personell weren't the only type of people he was trying to hide things from.

~0~

Once the sun started going down the construction crew began to shut down the site fore the night. Soon there was no one left at the site other than a lone security guard who would probably go inside his little booth to watch old reruns and take a little cat-nap.. Well Dean had his fair share of run ins with plenty of security guards and the guy he was looking at now only worked this job because there was hardly ever any real work to do.

Dean waited for the guy to complete one obligatory walk around the site, then watched him go into the little booth, sit down, turn on a rinky-dink T.V. set, lean back and kick his feet up onto the desk, just as predicted.

As soon as Dean was sure the security guard was well emersed in old episodes of Petticoat Junction he snuck into the site and down into what was once the basement of the Rodagan Hotel... Well it wasn't like Dean was going to let a little thing like "not having a warrant to search the entire premises" stop him!

He climbed down into the old elevator shaft and pried open the doors that lead into the basement.. It wasn't too much unlike just about every other basement he'd ever been in, in fact there didn't seem to be anything outstandingly worth hiding.. Really.. There seemed to be nothing special about the basement at all.. But, then WHY would the owner of the hotel freak out over having a "U.S. Marshall" wanting to have a look around down in the basement?.. After all the guy hadn't seamed to have had any problem when "The U.S. Marshalls" needed to search the ninth and fifteenth floors.

No.. Despite appearances, there had to be something worth hiding down in that cluttered old basement and Dean wasn't giving up till he figured out what it was and whether or not it had anything to do with the spirit that was attacking people. Dean searched every box, every dusty, rickidy filing cabinet.. Other than having a few discrepencies with "company spending" which would be proof enough that Mr. Conrad Lewis was embezziling from the payhecks of his employees and there even looked like quite a bit of tax evasion in more than half of the paperwork Dean was finding so yeah Conrad Lewis would be so screwed if Dean really worked for any kind of law enforcement agency.. But Dean didn't really work for any kind of law enforcement agency, so as far as Dean was concerned, searching the basement wasn't exactly leading him to the profound answers he'd been hoping for.

That was until Dean opened up a tall cabinet, it held brooms and mops and Dean was about to close the cabinet back up and walk away. But then he noticed that there was a top shelf and on that top shelf was a box. It was a small shoe box.. But Dean was used to finding make-shift alters, summoning rituals, seriously powerful Hoodo and Voodo crap in the strangest of places, so he reached up to pull the box down and when he did he accidently knocked a broom down from where it was hanging.. And when the broom fell it caught against the handle of one of the other brooms then sort of fell forward, but instead of the other broom falling down, it held firm to the spot it was hung.. But the spot it was hung DID move, it swung out, ever so slightly and that's when Dean realized, that the cabinet had a hidden door in the back...

He pried open the door and it turned out that it was no small door either, once it opened all the way a person could fit through. It was dark but Dean could tell that there was a hallway of some kind, so he pulled out his flashlight and started walking.

The beam of the flashlight revealed a really long cement tunnel, the further he walked down the tunnel, the colder it got, until he was numb from being so cold but Dean still followed the tunnel until he came to yet another door. This door was made of heavy steel, like the kind used for bombshelters and such and when Dean opened it and entered the space behind the door he found something that would haunt him for the rest of his life...

It was another hall but on each side of the hall there were cells, like PRISON CELLS and Dean could hear the frightened breathing of the inhabitants of those cells. He shined his light into the first cell he came across. Inside was a little girl, probably no older than ten and she was curled protectively around another, smaller child, another little girl who looked to be no older than four. Both girls were shaking uncontrolably and they both looked absolutely terrified. Dean's heart clenched in his chest as he realized that they were both naked and filthy, but even with all of the dirt covering them he could see awful bruises, scars and infected slices in their skin.. And the slices looked like numbers.. Just like with Sam.

"It's okay. I'm gonna get you guys out of there... You're safe now.. No one else is gonna hurt you." Dean said soothingly as he started picking the lock. The second the cell door swung opened the older girl started trying to better shield the younger one and by the sounds she was making Dean could tell that if he tried to reach for either child he'd have one hell of an akward fight on his hands.. Of course whoever had hurt these children obviously had to open the cell door to do so, meaning the children thought he was there to hurt them. The knowledge of such a fact made Dean want to cry.

"Okay." He whispered as he stepped away from the cell door, opening the cell wider as he did. "Okay I get it. I'm gonna stay out here. Alright?" He said as he raised his hands to keep them as visible as possible "But I'm gonna leave the door open.. So if you two don't want to stay in there anymore, you don't have to. Okay?" Then he turned and started walking down the rest of the hall.. Every cell.. EVERY single cell held two or more children captive within their bars, most of them were little girls.

He lost the contents of his stomach when he opened one cell to find a nine year old girl who was trying to protect a baby.. A BABY and from what Dean could see of the infant's legs, even the baby wasn't spared the cruelty that had been inflicted on the other children.

Of all the horrible things Dean had ever seen, this, what he was facing right then was by far the worst.. Those poor child had all obviously been starved, beaten, raped cut up and tortured.. And it looked like most if not all of them had been suffering such atrocities from the day they were born.. Which if Dean was right then that meant that some of the older children were most likely the mothers and fathers.. Maybe even sisters and brothers AND mothers and fathers of some of the younger children.

Once all of the cells he had found were opened.. Because there was no way in HELL that Dean was going to let any of those children stay in locked cells... He pulled out his phone and dialed nine-one-one.

And wasn't it just Dean's luck, that down in that cement cavern there just happened to be no signal?..

Dean had to leave all of the children down in that horrible place while he went to the surface and made a call to the cops because he couldn't get any of them to leave the cells.. Those cells were probably the only place where the children felt any relative safety, as long as there wasn't someone they felt intimidated by standing near the cell doors that was.. He felt really bad because in about thirty minutes all of these children were going to be frightened to the point of panic as the cops and paramedics forced them out of the only place they'd probably ever known and pried them away from each other to take them for medical care..

Knowing what the children were going to go through.. The very intiment examinations they'd have to endure, all the medical tests.. Possibly being seperated from their possible brothers and sisters or even sons and daughters as they're placed into the foster care system, those kids were going to go through so many more things that a child just shouldn't have to go through.. It shattered Dean's heart almost as much as knowing what sort of hell they'd already been through. But he knew that all those poor children were going to be safe now..

He also knew that it would take a really long time for any of those children to be able to understand that he had only been trying to do the right thing for them... That he had been trying to save them from the horrors that they'd been subjected to. He really wished that the children wouldn't be ripped out of each other's lives, especially when each other might have been the only good things in life any of those kids had ever had.

When he got to the surface he stayed out of sight and dialed nine-one-one. When he heard the blare of sirens and knew that the children would soon be rescued, he escaped from the construction site unseen so as not to blow his cover as a "U.S. Marshall". He'd let the REAL authorities handle how to deal with taking care of the children.. But after Dean was finished the authorities would be lucky to find any trace of one Mr. Conrad Lewis...

He understood now.. Boy did he understand.. And he almost didn't want to.. The girl, the spirit, that Dean had once thought was the one attacking people, she must have been held captive in one of those cells.. Just like those other children, half of whom looked like they very near to crossing the threshold of Death's door themselves.. And of course the girl could have become a vengeful spirit after having sufffered so badly in life.. PLUS she'd probably died with the knowledge of the suffering of all the other children, some of whom may have been her brothers, sisters, sons and daughters.. Maybe even her own mother and father had suffered the same ways all of those other children had.. Oh yeah, she definitely had good reason to be PISSED... But suddenly Dean didn't think that the spirit had been the one actually attacking all the people who'd been vicimized by some sort of "spiritual attack".. In fact NOW he was thinking that the spirit had only been trying to help the children that had been locked in those cells and that she'd probably just been trying to show herself to people who she could connect with, people who would understand, people like her.. But if it wasn't the spirit of the girl that was attacking and killing people then that left more holes in this case.. Holes that seemed imposible to fill in time to save Sam's life...


	4. Chapter 4

Sam felt weak and nausous as his body became disorientingly light.

He knew he was being lifted and that someone was taking him against his will while he was at his most vulnerable and he called out for the only person he wanted by his side.

"Dean.. Please help me." He pleaded in a broken whisper as he felt himself pulled from his hospital bed and lifted into the air and he vaguely wondered how it was that no one was noticing the fact that he was being taken as oblivion claimed his mind once more...

~0~

He felt like he'd done everything he could to make sure that the children he'd found in a man made hell were gotten to safety.. But his concious was still plagued by all the horrors still to come for all of those poor children. He honestly wished he could spare them any more pain and he felt horribly guilty that there was nothing more he could do for them.

When his phone rang.. He was expecting it. He knew every single one of those children had numbers carved into their flesh, even the infant he'd found and he knew that the local authorities would call him because the details involving the children, matched too closely to the "case" that "Marshall Taylor" was working on.

What he wasn't expecting was for his phone to ring so soon. It had only been about an hour since the children were discovered by the proper authorities..

Dean fumbled to get his cell phone open while trying not to wreck as he drove through the downpour of rain that had just started.

"Dean.".. The voice on the other end of the line sounded almost distraught.

Dean hadn't been expecting this.. But now that he heard the voice his heart fell as he stammered out "Doc.. What?.."

"Sam's gone.".. The doctor sounded genuinely remorsefull.. Like he himself was grieving the loss.

Dean felt a clenching sensation in his chest and he tried to breath but found he couldn't.. He didn't realize that at some point auto-pilot had taken over and made him pull over to the side of the road and stop the car.

It hit him all at once, the blinding pain and grief and he had to hold back a sob as he realized his baby brother had died alone, that he hadn't been there to comfort Sam and the last words he'd said to the person most precious to him in all the world had been so.. HURTFUL.. The last words he'd spoken to HIS Sammy had caused his already broken, little brother pain.

Dean couldn't bear it. He had hurt his little brother and now he'd never get the chance to see his brother alive again.. He would never get the chance to make things right.

"When?" Was the only word Dean could choke out as his world came crashing down and he vaguely wondered if Sam had passed away the second he'd realized that he'd lost the signal on his cell phone while down in that horrible place.

It was a weird thing to think about but he couldn't get it out of his head that Sam had died ALONE and while Sam was alone and dying, no one had been able to reach him...

It seemed to be the story of Dean's life.. Sam had needed him and he hadn't been there.. He had been in a place where there had been NO DAMN SIGNAL ON HIS CELL PHONE!.. Dean almost threw the phone right then and there until the doctor's voice broke through his mental tirade.

"About an hour and fifteen minutes ago." The doctor replied..

Anything else the doctor might have been saying got muted as Dean was feeling the agony of how much it sucked to be right.. Sam had died while he was down in that basement, where no one could call him.. He could have been there.. Maybe even on time.. He could have been by his brother's side, if he had gotten the call that Sam was dying .. But he didn't get that call because there'd been no signal.. It had been Dean's worst fear made real..

He had been so afraid to leave Sam's side because he'd been afraid that Sam would die the second he was too far away to get back in time to be there for Sam. But he'd also been too afraid to stay because if he did then Sam would have died because, the reason he was even in the hospital in the first place, had still been attacking him somehow.

It seemed like no matter what Dean would have done he could not have saved Sam, but Dean sure as hell wasn't seeing that.

In his mind there was no such thing as a situation where Sam couldn't be saved. And he, was always supposed to be the one to save Sam...

"Dean, I don't know what to do here." The doctor's statement barely broke through Dean's self recrimations.. The doctor didn't know what to do?.. Sam was HIS family!.. What gave the doctor the right to assume that he got to do anything? He hardly knew Sam!

"I need to know how he got out of this hospital unnoticed." Now the doctor seemed suspicious but Dean's mind went reeling.

"Wait.." Dean said in a winded gasp "You're saying that he's not?.."

"Oh god, I'm sorry.. No he disappeared from his bed and since he was in a coma and would have been too weak to have left on his own even if he did wake up..."

"He had to have been taken." Dean said, tersely finishing the doctor's sentence.

"I thought maybe you would have known something about it."

Dean had to admit, the doctor had a point in thinking that because in revealing monsters, ghosts and demons and what he and Sam did to get rid of them he'd ended up opening up about why he and Sam had practically non-existant medical histories. And admitting that they usually lied about their last names and their occupations had come with admitting that more than half the time one of them wound up hospitilized, they'd end up signing out A.M.A. (or escpaing from the hospital unnoticed) before even finding out the full extent of their injuries or illnesses to avoid ending up either institutionalised or behind bars.

"No.. I had nothing to do with it." Dean wanted to lie and say that he'd never take Sam from the hospital while he was unconscious and in need of medical care.. But that ship had sailed, because he and Bobby had done just that.. And as far as Dean knew, the heart issues, the old head injuries and the M.S. could have all been detected then if they'd just let Sam make it to the M.R.I. or had made him go through one in a different hospital since Siox Fall General had been infested with Leviathan at the time.

Hell, even with as sick as Sam was, Dean knew that if the cops had started acting suspicious that he would have taken Sam from the hospital despite the coma.. Yeah he would have taken Sam somewhere where he could get him medical attention that would be off of any official radar. But the truth was he had no idea how to safely move a person who was in an actual coma or how to care for that person during the move.

And Dean knew that none of the other hunters he was with would have taken Sam without contacting him first.

"Are there security cameras in the halls?" Dean asked trying to stay calm despite all of the nightmare scenarios running through his mind.

"Yeah, but I haven't got a way to get the."..

"I'll take care of getting the footage from the feeds.. I just need you to make sure you're ready to take care of whatever Sam might need medically when I get him back."

"Yeah.. I'll call in a few favors to make sure I'm prepared for anything."

"Thanks.. I'll call you as soon as I have him to let you know we're on our way back." Dean replied numbly as he pulled back onto the road and headed towards the hospital while dialing Garth's number to tell the others that Sam had been taken.

The doctor bade goodbye and goodluck to Dean before hanging up, then he set to work calling in favors with the O.R. staff to make sure that an O.R. would stay open and prepped and that a surgical team stayed ready for just in case Sam needed them along with making sure he could get access to everything else Sam might need on short notice, from M.R.I.'s to medications, the doctor had promised to be ready for anything and he wasn't going to break that promise.

~0~

Dean had just gotten the security guard at the hospital to relequish his post so that "Marshall Taylor" could review the security feeds for over the last four hours alone, when his cell phone started to ring again.

"Marshall Taylor here." Dean answered in the best profesionalvoice that he could muster as he searched the security camera footage for a sign of who or what had taken Sam.

"Dean." Garth's voice came out sounding panicked. "Eight other victims have disapeared from their hospital rooms in over the last two hours."

"Were they all in comas like Sam?"

"That's the weird thing, all the others that were taken had been awake. In fact, one had just talked to their doctor and the doctor walked out of the room, barely got the door closed, then realised she'd forgotten something and went right back in to get it. Dean, she hadn't been out of the room for more than fifteen, twenty seconds tops and when she went back in, the victim was gone.. There was no way in or out of that room except through the door that the doctor hadn't even gotten the chance to take her hand from when she'd turned right back around to go back in the room."

"What about the window?" Dean asked as he pulled op footage from outside Sam's hospital for just in case.

"The victim's room is on the sixth floor and the only windows in his room is a solid pane of glass and it doesn't open.. It was left in one piece. It's like the victim vanished into thin air."

Dean got to the time where Sam disappeared on the footage from the cameras on both ends of the hall outside of Sam's room and on the footage from the hospital's entire parking lot and parking garage. There was no activity in the hall and Sam's room was on the ninth floor.

But the footage from the parking garage.. That was a whole nother story.

Dean could clearly see four men having trouble getting his unconscious baby brother into the back of a van.

Dean had no idea how the men could have gotten Sam from the room without being caught on any of the cameras inside the hospital or how they had moved Sam so quickly from the room to the garage only to have trouble with carrying him now, but he'd figure all of that out later. First he had to find Sam..

He called Garth and had him get Kevin to run the van's plates while he went back to the basement of the Rodagan to search the hidden underground chamber in full, he just knew that there was something about the place that would lead him to Sam.

~0~

Sam couldn't grasp his bearings as he felt his head lulling side. His neck couldn't support the weight of his head and he found it agonizing to feel the weight of his head causing the vertabrae in his neck to click painfully out of place.

His body felt on fire with all of the tingling and aching sensations and he was regretting not having taken his medications before the oncoming attack from his M.S. could get out of hand.

But wait.. That wasn't right, he remembered there being a hospital and a doctor talking about the M.S. and his heart and..

Oh crap.. Dean had been there. Dean knew he was sick, knew he was weak.

That line of thinking made Sam's eyes snap open.

He wanted to tell Dean he was sorry that he didn't look for him. That he had been so lost without him.

He wanted to beg Dean not to leave him now that the truth about how weak he was, was out.

But instead of finding himself in the bright, smelling of antiseptic, clean hospital room he last remembered himself being in, he finds himself in a dim, moldy smelling.. Dungeon.. Because Sam had no better word for the room he's woken up in as he scans around him and sees chains, shackles and blood.

That's when fear hits him square in the chest as he realises that he's been chained to a slanted concrete slab and he has no clothes on.

He feels his heart stuttering in it's struggle to keep beating and all he can think is how he's too weak to survive going through the pain that he knows to anticipate. But he knows Lucifer won't let him die.

It feels like he's been betrayed, now that he knows the last three and a half years were never real.

Lucifer could be a truly cruel bastard.

His heart clenched in his chest as he remembered Dean swearing to be "Stone number one." for him and he felt tears stream down his face as his heart shattered with the knowledge that Dean hadn't really been there, hadn't really said those things.

There was the sound of a metal door creaking open then banging against concrete. A shadow loomed in the doorway and Sam waited for baited breath to hear Lucifer's sickeningly sweet voice speaking unwanted filth to him.

Memory and nightmare began to bleed into his real, waking present making the pain that started to rain down on him even more torturous.

He recognised the impact of a flogger on his skin.

He knew it would have only been a matter of time before Lucifer tired of the mind games and started to make things physical again.

He couldn't see the face of the person Lucifer was trying to use to taunt him with this time. He only knew it wasn't Dean or his dad.

He heard a voice shouting indicernable things about breaking.

Didn't Lucifer know that he was already broken?

Didn't Lucifer hear the doctor talking about the damage to his heart?

Didn't Lucifer hear the things Dean had said while he pointed a gun at him? Didn't Lucifer understand that, that had hurt him, that it had broken him?

He didn't know where he was anymore or what to believe. Part of him was so sure that the last three and a half years had been real. That he wasn't in The Cage with Lucifer anymore, that he could still have a chance to make things right with Dean but he was afraid to hope. Hope was almost as frightening as the despair but he catches himself hoping anyway.

Memory, nightmare, reality all churned together like a whirpool as Sam swam through varying states of consciousness. But none of those states of consciousness allowed for him to stay in their current for long and he would find himself being swept away by a different tide and there was nothing in the stormy sea of confusion and terror for him to grab onto...

~0~

Sam doesn't know how much time has passed. All he knows is that his body has been beaten, tortured and violated again and he's so sure that there have been multiple assailants.

But Lucifer does LOVE to play mind games.

The pain doesn't feel like it should.

Something about this pain feels more REAL.

But Lucifer did say that he's done a lot with pain. Maybe he's learned how to make it feel more real now?

There's a moment, he's pretty sure that he was close to lucid for a whole fifteen seconds where he realised he didn't recognise the faces hurting him.

It's the first time that Lucifer has used someone he's never known. Maybe Lucifer thought that this would be more entertaining?

He hears taunts of how no one loves him, how he's never been more than a burden to anyone, how he's never deserved anything good.. How he's worthless.

Lucifer could be a truly cruel bastard...

Fear, anger, disgust, shame and humiliation war against the battered soul that tries desperately to cling to faith, trust, hope and love.

It's a true test of strength for him to keep holding on and the pain of everything happening to him disguises the fact that more cuts have formed on his left pectoral muscle...

There's agony and so much blood that red is all Sam can see before things fade to black once more...

~0~

Blurred shapes and muted colors are the only things he can see when his eyes open again.

He hates it when Lucifer takes away his ability to see.

There's muffled voices coming from all around him and.. Lucifer is laughing at him, singing "I told you, so. I told you, so. You never, left, The Cage."

It's all too much and he clenches his eyes firmly shut and plans to never open them again.

The feeling of being torn in half, long ways, from the bottom up as someone forces something large, blunt and unforgiving into his bowels, makes his eyes fly open from the intensity of the pain.

It's a good thing he hadn't planned to not give Lucifer the satisfaction of his screams or he'd be having to deal with his failure over that as well.

He can see the shadowy form of the rapist looming over him.

He can feel a fleshy, sweat slicked, male phalicy pulsing as it slides between the flesh of his buttocks to painfully, bottom out inside him and he tries to fight back.

He's pretty sure that when he thrusted his head forward that he connected to the center of a face.

It almost gives him a good feeling to know that he can make Lucifer scream to.

He thinks Dean would be proud..

He hears yelling. He's pretty sure it's directed at him. Something about a broken nose and bad behavior and he's also pretty sure that he doesn't give a damn.

Lucifer deserved it!

There's more pain. He's pretty sure that he's being flogged again. But it's to be expected.

Lucifer would never let his fighting back go unpunished.

There's the smell of burnt flesh and he's screaming because he knows he's been branded.

Hot metal scorches his skin again and he knows it won't stop. It never stops until Lucifer has branded every inch of him.

But Lucifer will take away the burns, the skin will be like new, then Lucifer will start it, all, over, again.

The pain leaves him shaking, whimpering, there's tears pouring down his face and he feels so.. Lost.. There's so much despair because he knows it will never stop.

Lucifer will never stop. Will never, leave, him, alone.

There's so much despair and it's eating away at the good things, it's trying to take away the light of hope.

He's lost count of how many times the number on both sides of his right thigh and bottom lip has increased due to the new rapes being recorded in the macabre log carved all over his body.

The despair he felt from everything crashing together was so frighteningly overwhelming.

But he held onto hope.

He didn't even know what he was hoping for anymore. But he was hoping anyway.

He let out a pained groan as more cuts formed on his left pectoral muscle. He didn't know what they represented yet or why they were taking so long to complete. He just wanted the pain to stop.

He wanted to be found, to be safe, to finally be good enough, to finally get to deserve having something good, to be loved.. To not be worthless anymore...

~0~

Dean climbed down into the elevator shaft and pried the elevator doors to the basement open once again.

He no longer had to worry about any security guards because the entire construction site was now a closed crime scene.

The "B" button lit up the second Dean pried the doors open and the sound of the ding of the elevator doors going off almost gave Dean a heart attack. There hadn't been power in the elevator last time. Maybe the cops had to turn it on to get the children out of the basement?

He scanned everything he came across as he made his way back to the hidden underground chamber he had found the children in almost three hours ago. Everything he could possibly find meant more, was so much more important now that it might be the one thing that helped him find Sam.

Finding the cells again made Dean feel as if he were about to be sick.

There was still blood in places on the walls and floor and the smell of infected wounds still hung in the air and it took everything Dean had not to lose it right then and there.

He had to keep a level head.

He had to go further into the chamber, to wherever the rest of the tunnel led.

He hadn't been able to keep searching before, but he wasn't going to leave any stone unturned this time.

He had to find a way to get Sam back...


	5. Chapter 5

..

..

She preffered to be called Angie.. She hated her given name because she was more than a few millinia old and she still could not pronounce her own name properly. She had absolutely no idea what Bergelmir had been thinking when he allowed her mother to give her a name that only a handful of beings in the whole univers could pronounce. And Angie was NOT in that handful..

Maybe that was part of her curse.

Of course it was. She's wasn't a fool and she knew it wasn't a coincedence that it would have to be the proper pronounciation of her name spoken out loud that frees her from captivity. She would love to serve Odin's balls to him on a platter for making it so easy to bind her. She is a Goddess, yet her imprisoment binds all of her powers except the abilities that her captor uses for his own sick means.

She had been wishing for the day where she could be free so that she could reign despair upon the man who was using her powers to victimize innocent people. Then the day came where she smelled a familiar scent and thought her love had come to rescue her, but her love's scent was faint and carried in by the stronger scents of two hunters and one other who smelled faintly of her her love while also smelling like a thunderstorm.

She knew that the hunters and perhaps even the other, would prove to be strong allies, if only she could alert them to her presence...

~0~

Dean followed the tunnel past the area where he had found the cells, it turned out that the tunnel looked to be bricked up after so far down, which explained why the cops weren't still down there doing a search.

But the bricked up look was deceiving in it's appearence for it hid a secret chamber that eventually widened out to reveal that the tunnel continued on past the wall. The main tunnel had many areas were it forked and Dean had to resist the urge to explore where each fork in the tunnel lead. He knew that he had to find where the main tunnel lead to first, then he could back track and check the other tunnels that branched out.

The further he went down the main tunnel, the colder it became. It was just like when he had searched the first part of the tunnel earlier. He wondered if the spirit of the girl had indeed moved on once the children had been rescued or if she was still here, or if it was the spirit of another child, who had died in such a horrible way, that was causing the frigid cold.

The tunnel became so cold that the walls, the ceiling and the floor were covered in several thin layers of ice and suddenly Dean knew that something was way, way off because there's no kind of spirit that he knows of that has the ability to make it that damned cold nor the ability to keep the temperature so consistantly freezing enough for ice to actually accumulate.

The main tunnel led to an icy brick wall that had two doors. One door was HUGE, and made from some kind of metal that Dean couldn't identify under all of the ice and the other door was small and looked to have once been some kind of service access to the sewers. The huge door had some sort of metal locking mechanism that encompassed a wide array of strange designs that had been etched into the metal.

Dean wished he had Sam with him because Sam would have probably known what all the symbols meant. Dean could hear Sam saying "They look to be some type of hyrogliphics.. Possibly Aztec.. Maybe Incan." or something really smart and geeky like that.

Whatever the symbols where, they were important so Dean took pictures of each of them.

For now Dean had to assume that it wouldn't be safe to try and open either door until the symbols were translated but he needed to search the rest of the tunnels before he could return to the surface where he'd have a signal on his cell phone so that he could send the pictures.

Searching the mostly dead end tunnels became frustrating to Dean, there was only one tunnel that made the search worth while. It went straight to the surface and looked to be some sort of vehicle access. Dean figured that it must have been how the sick freak or freaks had moved children into and out of the basement of the Rodagan without being seen.

Dean used the vehicle access and made his way to the surface. The tunnel had lead out to a place that was secluded and well hidden by several trees and lots of wild shrubs. Dean figured that the tunnel's vehicle access had lead to about ten miles out of the city. That meant he'd been underground, following the vehicle access for over three hours without realising it. The only thing that had mattered to him was the hope that the vehicle access would somehow lead to Sam and when it hadn't Dean became more agrivated because he didn't know where Sam was or what was happening to him.

As soon as he made his way to a spot where his cell phone could recieve a signal, Dean sent the pictures of the strange symbols to Garth's cell phone and waited. Because if Cas could do a speedy translation, then it might be possible for Dean to figure out how to open both doors at the end of the main tunnel and see where they might lead...

~0~

The smell of her love had disappeared for some time, so Angie was estatic when suddenly she smelled the scent of her love being carried closer by the air of one of the hunters. This hunter also carried with him the scents of the other two she had scented earlier and now that he was closer she could sense that the other hunter was this one's son/brother/soulmate all wrapped into one man and the other sent, the one who smelled like a thunderstorm, he was family to the hunters, but also to her love in ways that she couldn't yet identify.

She did what she could to alert the hunter to her presence, but the only power she had access to was her ability to make it colder in the area around her cell and the only reason she still had access to at least that was the fact that she would die without the frigid temperature that only she or another Hyperborean God could manifest. Her heart broke with disapointment as her attempt to be found failed because the scent of the hunter and the scents he carried with him began to weaken until they vanished again once more...

~0~

Dean's phone rang only a little over five minutes after he'd sent the picture text butn the wait had felt like forever.

"Please have good news." Dean begged as he answered the phone.

"Cas says the symbols are mostly a mix of Germanic, Nordic and Celtic BUT.." Garth replied wearily as he tensed up in preperation from the lashing out of Dean's temper.. At least he was well out of swinging distance, or so he hoped and of course he gave a quick look around just to be sure.

"But what?" Dean growled.

"DEFINITELY PISSED." Garth thought as he answered.

"Then there's some that are only known to those who are from certain parts of the land of the Fae."

"Damn it Garth!" Dean barked "Cas is a friggin angel, he should know every friggin language there is!"

"Well, none of the Fae are exactly forethcoming about their secrets." Castiel's voice stated from the background. That's when Dean realised he was on speaker.

"Cas." Dean did his best to reel in his temper before he threw his phone. "Is there a way to find out what the symbols you can't translate mean?"

"I doubt it. The Fae don't exactly like angels."

"I don't give a damn, whether they like you or not! I don't care what you have to do, get me a translation!"

"It's going to take some time."

"I'm giving you thirty minutes, Cas."

"Dean, that's imposs.."

"Make it happen." Dean snarled the order as he abruptly hung up to cut off any more of Cas' attempts to get him to see reason. The only thing Dean saw as reasonable at the moment was slaughtering whatever and whoever stood in the way of him getting Sam back, alive. Anything and everything else could be eventually dealt with as long as Sam was still alive.

~0~

His hands were bound above his head and he was hanging from his wrists and the tips of his toes were barely scraping the ground.

Parts of his body had been torqued into grotesque angles, he could feel the bone of one of his ribs jutting against the soft, squishy tissue of his heart, while another protuded his right lung, the constriction on both sides made it nearly impossible to breath.

But in Hell, injuries like those don't matter.

Lucifer will make sure that he keeps breathing, even when he's reduced to nothing more than a wasted, charred, bloody pile of his own insides.. And that just so happens to be one of Lucifer's favorite ways to have him, so he knows the feeling quite well.

He's pretty sure that Lucifer's already taken the pleasure to rip his intestines out with a barbed, feline penis.. Turns out Lucifer sees himself as part lion. Or maybe that's all angels.

He vaguely remembers someone talking about Zachariah saying he had four faces, one of which was a lion and he also remembered that somewhere in The Bible it talked about how a lot of different angels had four faces that faced the four corners, six wings, two legs, but four feet on each leg that also pointed to the four corners.

He was lost to thoughts about what angels might really look like and it got him to thinking of Cas. He'd bet money on one of Cas' faces being a dove, as it was the only bird he could think of that could find it's way home, even when that home had moved.. And Cas always found his way to him and Dean somehow no matter how much they moved around.

Or at least he was pretty sure that the Ark hadn't set still the entire time it took for the dove to find an olive branch..

That was another reason he was sure that at least one of Castiel's faces must be a dove, because he was always trying to bring peace into chaos.. And then there was the fact that as much as Cas did his best to help, he was sort of a 'bird brain' about a lot of things. The thought of how Cas looked like a bird when he tilted his head made Sam start laughing as his broken mind, started putting an image of Cas tilting his head side by side of an image of a dove doing the same, the comparrison was just too uncanny.

He heard footsteps approach and he started taunting his captor.

"Come back to play, Little Luci?" Lucifer hated being reffered to as little in any way and he hated being called "Luci" even more, but Sam would gladly risk Lucifer's wrath because it meant that Lucifer would focus on him and leave Michael alone for a while.

"What did you just say?" Asked a voice that wasn't Lucifer's, but Lucifer has played this game, SO MANY times.. Sam honestly wonders who Lucifer is using to torture him with this time.

Could they be someone he barely knew in passing while at Stanford?

Perhaps they were various people from cases, he's worked? After all he's lost count of how many cops, grieving husbands, grieving fathers, coroners, priests and cemetary caretakers he's briefly crossed paths with throughout his life.. Then there was all of the gas station attendants, hotel managers, cashiers, bartenders.. The list went on, of the grab bag of faces that Lucifer could choose from in this new reality he had created.

Lucifer must be bored as hell.. The thought of that irony made Sam laugh again.

He felt a dull, searing pain in his back as a belt lashed into him.

"What's so funny?" The voice that Lucifer was using asked angrily.

"Jus thinkin 'ff how b. . you had. be to come up with all of this." Sam could barely manage to whisper though all of the blood either conjealing in or bubbling out of his mouth.

There was more pain as the man started punching him in the torso.

"Crazy bastard." The man muttered as he momentarily moved away.

Man, Lucifer hated it all of the times he managed to find distractions from the pain.

Sam was lost in thought again, this time he thought about his anchor, his rock, his brother.

"Dean." His mind cried, he needed the strength that thinking about his brother, his protector provided. Without that strength, he would break.

Sam could sense that the man had returned.

As he felt the hits from what he could only guess was a wooden baseball bat he let part of his mind wail for how he missed his brother while another part of his mind retreated from the pain and the rest of his mind wondered what Lucifer would have in store for him over the course of the rest of eternity...

He sometimes wondered if Lucifer was even aware that he could loose consciousness here.

Or if Lucifer knew anything about how a human soul was rendered by only the effects of The Cage itself..

After all he was presumably the only human to ever wind up there. So how would Lucifer know what just the tortures of The Cage could do to a person all by themselves?

Maybe he was unconscious only because The Cage itself allowed it?

Maybe it was divised as part of the torture?

It would seem like it, especially since every time he passed out he woke up either to a different torture than the one that rendered him unconscious or he'd wake up tied in yet another contorted position, which would eventually lead to more torture once it was noticed he was awake.

Maybe it was all just a part of the mentality of the person being tortured? It was after all highly unnerving to be so disoriented and confused each time he came to.

Maybe it was all apart of Lucifer's game and had nothing to do with The Cage? Maybe The Cage has no effect on a human soul, yet is designed to drive Archangels insane?

Maybe that's why the torture is different all of the sudden? Maybe Lucifer's finally lost it?...

Like Michael lost it about eighty years ago?...

"Or maybe I've finally lost it?" Sam thinks, as he wakes up to the escruciating pain of the thick part of the baseball bat being shoved so intimently into his bowels.

But he doesn't scream. He hasn't been able to scream for hours...

~0~

Lucifer's voice mocks him. Calls him weak.

He hears his dad saying he's not good enough.

His father tells him he's the reason his mom is dead.

He hears the Yellow Eyed Demon talk about why his mom and Jessica died and he knows his father was right.

He hears as Dean practically says he wasn't a good enough son to their father and by extension their mother because he had left for a "Normal life" instead of questing to avenge her.

He hears Dean practically saying that he's not a good enough brother.

His father tells him he's going to be the reason Dean dies.

He watches, again and again as Dean gets ripped to shreds by Hellhounds and knows his dad was right yet again.

Lucifer taunts him. Tells Sam that his own father's last thoughts in life had been about how Sam would become evil and how Dean would have to kill him.

He listens over and over again as Dean's voice calls him a "Monster." a "Blood sucking FREAK." a "Vampire."

He hears Castiel saying "Worthless."

He watches countless times as Dean throws away the thing that had symbolized their bond for nearly twenty years.

Sam weeps as he scoops The Amulet from the bottom of the trash can and cradles it to his broken heart because he just can't leave it there. It's a part of him, it's his heart, his soul and it belongs to Dean, but Sam can't leave it in the garbage even if that's what Dean feels Sam deserves.

He watches in his mind's eye as he falls into The Cage and sees how The Amulet represents him, the way it fell, the way he fell, and he hopes that Dean will find where he hid it and understand that it's a part of THEM. That it's a part of them and he couldn't throw it away and he hopes if Dean does find it someday that he won't throw it away again or think it "Worthless" ever again.

He doesn't want his love to be "Worthless".

The hope that Dean will someday think Sam is "Good enough" that Sam's love is "Worth" wearing The Amulet again is sometimes the only thing that keeps Sam going in such a horrible place like The Cage.

He wants so bad, just to be good enough. To be a good enough son, to be a good enough brother, to be good enough to have salvation.

He doesn't want to be an "abomination", he doesn't want to be tainted or dirty, he doesn't want to become evil and most of all he doesn't want to let Dean down. So he can't let The Cage break him.

He refused to break, even when Lucifer tried tempting him with a reprive from the torture if he would torture Michael.

Lucifer told Sam that it was okay, that it was actually Michael's fault that they're both in The Cage in the first place.

Lucifer called Michael "Daddy's good lttle soldier." said that Michael is "A good dog that obeys his Master." and that's why they're in The Cage, so it was okay to cause him pain, that it was right and just and would give them both vengeance.

Sam refused and when Lucifer turned to hurt Michael his self, Sam stepped in between them and begged Lucifer to leave Michael alone and even after sixty years of pain, he offered himself up to Lucifer in Michael's stead.

He remembers hearing Michael crying and wailing to a father that couldn't hear him "Save him father, I beg you!"

He remembers Michael pleading with Lucifer "Brother! Look at what we've done! We've condemened a truly righteous man to a cruel fate! If you continue to hurt him now, then you will deserve a damnation far worse than the one our father created for you here!"

He doesn't know what Michael meant, doesn't think that Michael could have possibly been talking about him.

But he does know that both GOD and Lucifer ignored Michael's pleas.

That seemed like more than a century ago. And because GOD and Lucifer had ignored Michael's pleas, Michael was driven to insanity and Sam was helpless as he watched Michael lose his mind.

That's when Lucifer had seperated them and Sam hasn't seen Michael since and Lucifer wouldn't say what was happening with Michael, instead Lucifer just seems more determined than ever to make Sam suffer unspeakable agony, to break Sam, to make Sam shatter.

~0~

When he wakes up again, he wonders how long he's been unconscious for this time, he knows, that night has turned to day and he applauds Lucifer for including such details as roosters crowing in this new reality that's been created for Lucifer's entertainment.

He tries to open his eyes, but one is too swollen and crusted in blood, so he can only manage to partially open one and even then his eyesight is blurry.

This time he's chained with his arms above his head, but he's hanging against a wall instead of the middle of the room.

It gave him an opprotuntity to take in more of the surroundings that Lucifer had put in place. He had to say that Lucifer put in a lot of work on the details.

Normally it would be, or it would at least resemble, a place he's been before. But Lucifer has upped his game and created a whole new place that Sam has never seen, let alone ever been in.

Maybe it was a mash up of several different places?

It looked like there were catacombs. Which would be easy enough to fuse with what looked to be the combination of a steriotypical dungeon, creepy ass old world basement and slavery auction house all rolled into one.

It was possible that Lucifer had taken multiple places from books Sam had read, movies Sam had seen and Sam's real life experiences to create this place.

As he speculated how and with what Lucifer had created this new reality, he looked around as much as he possibly could and saw a familiar face.

"That's weird." He whispered outloud.

He wasn't expecting to see Bela Talbot and he wondered just how Lucifer was going to use her to hurt him...

~0~

When the thirty minutes he'd given Cas were up he hit the speed dial and impatiently waited for Garth to pick up.

Garth didn't even get a chance to say anything as Dean snapped "Put Cas on the phone."

"Dean?" Castiel's voice sounded weary.

"You better have good news."

"All I could find out is that the symbols come together to state that behind that door is an imprisoned Goddess, whose name must be spoken outloud to free her."

"What does that mean exactly?"

"I don't know?"

"How do I open the door?"

"I'm guessing you turn the doorknob."

"Now's not the time to be a smartass."

"I'm not. The symbols give no indication that the door is different from any other door."

"What about the locking mechanism?"

"The symbols give no indication that there's any special way to unlock the door, Garth thinks the lock looks like something off of shipping containers that are meant for shipping things that need to be secured, like biohazards."

"So, there's no bad magic on the door?"

"No."

"What about the Imprisoned Goddess? What does an Imprisoned Goddess have to do with what's happening?"

Garth's voice came on the line again "Well according to lore. If certain spells are used, Gods and Goddesses can be bound, or imprisoned and then whoever is keeping them bound or captive can use that God's or Goddess' powers as if they were their own and the God or Godess is left immortal but with no powers unless their captors grant them the use of a power. So they wouldn't be able to do anything to stop the misuse of their powers because essentially they've been made human."

"Well, that sounds like it sucks to be the Goddess. But what does that have to do with what's happening?"

"Well maybe whatever or whoever is hurting people is using the Goddess' power. After all, the simultaineous multiple attacks, the odd way those people disappeared..."

"Too much for just a spirit to pull off."

"Right."

"So if she's freed then.."

"Whatever or whoever is using her power loses the powers and the powers go back to her."

"So, then tell me about this Goddess."...

"As far as we can tell she's the Germanic "Distress Bringer.". Um, some kind of Frost Giant, a Hyperborean as best as I can tell."

"Distress Bringer. That doesn't sound good."

"Well according to lore she's one of the good guys, she supposedly only brings distress to those who deserve it."

"Well then hopefully she'll be on our side. And I can set her free just by saying her name?"

"Yeah."

"So.. What's her name?"

"I can't pronounce it."

"Put Cas back on the phone." Dean was getting annoyed, fast.

"He can't pronounce it either."

"Damn it Garth! Just spell the damn thing out!"

"A-N-G.."...

There was a noise that sonded like metal caught in a garbage disposal, then Garth's end of the line became silent.

"Garth?!..".. Dean pulled the phone from his ear to see on the screen that the call had been dropped and there was no longer a signal.

"Damn it!" Dean cursed as he kicked the trunk of a nearby tree. "Son of a bitch!"

He wanted to cry. Setting the Goddess free might be the only way to save Sam...

The Goddess.. The door...

"Just open the door and get HER to tell you her name dumbasss!" Dean's mind shouted in reprimand.

It may have taken him over three hours to reach the end of the underground vehicle access the first time, but he flew through the tunnel this time and it took him only half the time to get back to the doors...

When he pulled the lever up and slid it over then turned the wheel, the twenty foot tall door unlocked and opened without any problems.

The temperature in the room was the coldest Dean had ever felt, he'd heard the expression "Colder than Hell." before, many times. But this kind of cold gave that phrase meaning.

A chill, not from the cold, went up Dean's spine as he thought about Hell, about how Lucifer had said he "Burned cold.".. Now all Dean could think about was Sam and "Did Sam spend over a hundred years, feeling even colder than this?"

The thought replayed itself a few times and each time brought with them new images of Sam, huddled in a corner, trying to get warm, of Sam covered in frost, shivering, crying in pain from just the cold, of Sam cowering as Lucifer towered over him.. Then there were thoughts of Sam being beaten, tortured, violated in the worst possible ways.. He kept seeing his baby brother, the kid he practically raised, beaten to a bloody pulp, flinching at the slightest of triggers.

Dean wanted to break down and sob, he wanted to have Sam back, he wanted Sam back safe, unharmed, and Chick-Flick Moments be damned, he didn't care, he wanted to hold his little brother, to comfort Sam, take away all of the bad and protect Sam from ever being hurt again, even from himself..

He was so ready to just tear Alantic City apart brick by brick, till it was all rubble or until he found Sam and he would find Sam and then he might still go ahead and tear down Alantic City, just on principle.

Then when Sam was found and the city was laid to waste from Dean Winchester's wrath, Dean would cradle Sam.. YES cradle him, hold him, whisper soothing reassurances in his ear along with promises of a real home and an end to hunting for good if that's what Sam really wanted. Saving people, hunting things, the family business, could all go to Hell, for all Dean cared, saving people, sheer strangers with bad enough luck to come face to face with things from the supernatural realm, wasn't important anymore if it meant possibly loosing Sam.

In the center of the room was a fifteen foot tall pillar of ice and it wasn't until Dean saw chains that were bolted to the wall tethered to that pillar of ice was in fact the imprisoned Goddess.

He set to work with getting rid of the chains he could reach and the Goddess begain to stir.

"I'm here to help." He stated quickly. Powers or no powers she could still hurt him with the strength of her size if she wanted to.

"I know." The Goddess replied. "I was wondering if you'd ever open the door."

"I.. Uh.. Well, okay then.." Dean let himself trail off. He hadn't expected her to seem like she'd known that he had been outside.

"I've been waiting since the first time I caught your scent almost a week ago." She sounded like she had been so desperate for rescue.

Dean could only imagine how she must of felt. Which led to him thinking about how Sam must be feeling.

He worked faster at dispatching the chains from the bound Goddess and soon she was free of the chains.

"So.. I need to know your name so we can get you your powers back." Dean stated as he moved towards the door.

"I can't pronounce it."

"You can't pronounce your own name?" Dean felt the situation was incredulous with it's irony.

"I'm afraid that's part of my curse.. After all it's only my name spoken outloud properly that will truly set me free.. Makes me wish I didn't start making everyone call me Angie the second I turned five moons old.. Maybe then I'd at least know how to say my own name."

Oh yeah.. Definitely ironic.

"Okay "Angie"... Can you spell it for me?"

Just then noises echoed through the tunnel. It sounded like voices.

Interupted again, Dean needed to get the Goddess out of here, then he could ask her to write her name down.

"Rrrriiiigghhhttt... A fifteen foot tall, moving, block of ice that was shaped like a woman isn't gonna attract any kind of unwanted attention."

Dean had no idea what he'd been thinking. There was no way..

"Underground vehicle access. That leads to isolated woods."

"Duh."

This felt almost as bad as the time he'd tried to break open a pane of glass with the butt of his LOADED pistol.

"I need to get you out of here." He said as he tried to nudge the Goddess to follow him.

And of course the second he stepped out of the room he came face to barrel with a standard police issue nine milimeter GLOCK...

~0~

It was almost nice to see a familiar face.

Okay.. So the owner of the face had shot him once and had intended to kill him on at least one occasion.

But Sam was pretty sure Bela had been a wounded soul, like him.

There had once been, just something kismet between them that he'd recognized when he'd crossed paths with her a second time.. Like he had felt she might have been someone who could've related to some of the horrible things he'd suffered through during his childhood.

Then there had been the other connection he had with her. The dirty, naughty, semi-wet dream he'd once had about her, that he still felt guilty about sometimes.

Maybe that's why she was here?

Maybe Lucifer wanted to rub his nose in what a dirtybadwrong pervert he could be?

BUT.. If Lucifer, really, wanted to convince him that this was reality was real, and Lucifer had been working so very hard at that (and very nearly succeeding to the point where he could harly tell where the blurry lines between The Cage and this reality were), then Lucifer wouldn't have brought in a face that he was sure to recognize.

Unless Lucifer was as far gone as him and wasn't realizing there was the face of someone he knew to be dead interjected into a reality he was suppossed to believe is real?

Maybe Michael going of the deep end really did finally cause Lucifer to go off the deep end?

After all Lucifer had gotten even more surly and violent right after he had taken Michael to a different part of The Cage.

At this rate it wouldn't be long until Lucifer drug images of Dean into this game..

Lucifer was either crazy or bored or both.

They were stuck here for eternity after all, Sam knew he deserved that, but even Lucifer had an imagination that stretched only so far.

Or maybe Lucifer kept coming back to the same things because they worked?

He gave Bela what he hoped was a comforting smile... There was no reason to be unfriendly after all, she was chained up like him and it looked like she'd been through a hell of a beating and maybe even worse, if Sam knew Lucifer the way he thought he did then definitely worse.

And even though he knew she wasn't really here Sam didn't want to see her or anyone suffering, especially not for the sake of Lucifer's sick games.

Sometimes he wished Lucifer would leave other people out of it, even the faces he didn't recognize were faces that shouldn't be here. It was the worst kind of wrong to bring pain, degredation or dishonor to others, even if those others were figments of his and Lucifer's demented imaginations.

Sam blushed as he realized Bela was as naked as he was.

Of course she was, because either Lucifer was making a point of hurting her in front of him or he was making a point that he was a sick bastard that had once had the beginnings of a filthy dream about the poor woman now chained before him and this was a display of what was happening to her now, somewhere else in Hell, because she'd been unlucky enough to simply cross paths with him.

Yeah, now he felt really guilty for that dirty dream.

He'd picked up long ago on the pattern that any woman he had any kind of sexual attraction to ended up dead. And now here Bela's image was, being used in Lucifer's sick and twisted reality. She didn't deserve that, even if she did once intend to kill him.

He felt more alterations to various carvings all over his body, a few more for numbers for all the times and ways he'd been raped, a few more numbers for the guilt.. Honestly he was loosing track of what was being recorded where, even with the creepy as voice insistantly whispering inside his mind to try to force him to remember and comprehend.

But the part of him that could grasp any of that had started slipping away.. He couldn't remember when.

So he just hung there, kept trying to wordlessly reassure Bela, because his wrecked throat couldn't handle allowing him to make any sort of noise, let alone handle allowing him to speak.

It was him, Bela and maybe two or even three other people hanging on the walls, but he couldn't see so well at the moment with the lights so dim and his periphial vision messed up so much and some kind of collar kept him from turning his head. So, the only person he could see at the moment was Bela.

He felt the tingling sensations that signaled a new onslaught of his MS rearing it's ugly head to bite and attack with a fury and vengence so harsh that he had no clue what he'd been thinking when he'd decided skipping his meds was a good idea. He honestly didn't want to have to deal with the severity of attacks like the one he could feel coming, and he definitely didn't want to have to endure the intensity of such strong and frequent back to back attacks like he knew would happen without the proper dosages and timely uses of his medicines.

Nope.. No idea what he'd been thinking when he thought quiting his meds was a good plan.

"Except.. All of this isn't real." A voice that sounded like Lucifer whispered in his ear. "You know what you have to do to end it."

"You know what you have to do to see what's real, Sammy."

"Don't call me that." He growled at the voice. "You already know that I won't.. I won't let you make me go that far."

"Aww.. Sammy."

"I said don't call me that!"

"You've already gone that far a few times. Look at your arms.."

"You know I can't... Unless you want to unchain me.. Then we can really start having some fun."

"Kinky.. But I think I like you like this."

"Then shut up and either end the game or get out of my head and leave me be."

"So you're fine with this reality then are you?"

"No, I'm just smart enough to know there's nothing I can do about it."

"Except there is and you know it."

"Not gonna happen."

"I gotta hand it to you, I had no idea you were such a sicko that would get off on all of this."

"I don't.. You know I don't."

"Thou does protest to much, Sammy."

"Do not call me.."

"If you don't get off on it, then why won't you end it? Hmm?"

"Because.."

"Because, you're not sure. Well, isn't that just friggin hilarious?!"

Sam's every molecule was screaming in agony as the tingle spread from the tips of the fingers on his right hand down his arm up his neck, across his jaw, straight to his temple then to the back of his skull where a strange sensation that felt like pop rocks fizzing erupted it the lowest part of the brain.

Then the tingling spread across his shoulder around to cover his chest. The tingling over his chest became a tightening, it became harder to breath, then there was a horrible clenching pain as his heart started seizing in it's struggle to beat.

He was gasping and weazing when two men came and took him down from the wall...

There were muttered voices about "What.. do.. Ones that won't break. Think this one's dying."

Sam just hung limp and lifeless between the two men that drug him to what might finally be the end to this game..

But he knows that Lucifer doesn't give up that easily

~0~

When he comes to again he doesn't even remember having passed out, and he really hates feeling so confused and disoriented.. But on the upside the pain in his chest had subsided.

There's more voices saying something about "Found out something that might break him."

He felt himself being bent over a rough concrete slab and his wrist shackled down out to his sides, over the ends of the concrete, where if he struggled his wrist would be rubbed raw by both the metal and the cement, then a metal bar was placed long ways between his legs and his ankles were chained to each end.

He was positioned perfectly for anyone to take in any way they wanted. His head hung off the other end and some sort of metal ring was forced into his mouth and behind his teeth, then leather straps were buckled behind his head to help forcefully keep the ring in place.

This part of the game Sam knew all to well. So he wasn't surprised when the first in what he knew was going to be a long line, of assailants strided around to his face and shoved a smelly, sweaty, fleshy cock into his mouth.

That didn't mean that it was any less degrading though.

And he really wasn't surprised when another assailant began to anally sodomize him. But it didn't make it any less painful.

He lost count after being used each way by six different men, but the tallies carving themselves into his flesh seemed fine with keeping track for him.

After a while things proceeded from rape back to torture again.

Of course it always did and always would.

Until Lucifer got bored and moved things back to rape. And if he was in a really bad mood he'd combine them both.

He felt a few dozen lashes of leather against his bare back and buttox and all through all of the rape and torture there was nothing he could do to hold back his hoarse cries of agony, anger, guilt, shame, humiliation and fear.

He had been so lost to the all of the pain that in his daze he hadn't realized that there was a struggling figure chained high up against the wall. The figure would have had a pefect view of all of the spectacles before them.

He knew it would have been only a matter of time for Lucifer to get this bored.

Lucifer loved using Dean in so many ways...

It looked like this time Lucifer was wanting to make him think that Dean was being forced to watch what was happening to him.

And Dean.. He was fighting like a hellcat to get free.

Sam had to admit.. Lucifer was getting really, really good at creating a realistic Dean..

Sam was taken out of the chains and the ring was removed from his mouth, but he was left laying against the cement slab.

One of the men, an older guy who looked vaguely familiar.. But Sam could swear the only time he'd ever seen the guys face was when he pulled up information for a hunt.. The guy owned a hotel they thought had to do something with a string of attacks by what looked to be a spectre.. But that wasn't real.. Yanked his hair, got in his face.. Asked him a question, or gave him an order.. Or was saying something to him.. But he couldn't understand a word the guy said nor could he decern the intention of the words.. Whether they were meant to ask, demand or inform.

It didn't matter that he couldn't understand though because obviously his failure to give whatever response the guy was looking for, pissed the man off so much so that the guy begain to rain punches down over his already battered head and shoulders.

All he could do was slide from the platform and puddle into the floor, but the men, Lucifer, wouldn't have any of it.

He was hoisted to his feet by a man on either side and he could make out words "Easier if you just break."

Sam actually managed to huff out a laugh at that.

What exactly qualified as broken?

If he wasn't broken now, then he'd never be. Because this was as far as he could go. He'd been forced to relive pains of all of his past traumas a hundred times fold.

This was him laid bare, literally because he was in The Cage and every ounce of his body, mind, heart and soul was on display.

Every memory, even things he'd repressed in life and forced himself to forget, he was forced to remember.

Every single memory. Even the ones Lucifer's bastard of a brother, Zachariah, tried to scrub away.

Michael had once cried that Lucifer continuing to hurt him was a horrible unforgivable injustice.

And he'd looked at Michael, smiled and said that it was okay because he deserved to be here, in The Cage, he deserved to suffer.

He truly believed that even an eternity here would never be punishment enough for the things he'd done or caused to happen.

He truly believed that no amount of pain would be enough to pay pennance.

He'd smiled at Michael and had gladly, willingly offered himself up to Lucifer so that Michael wouldn't be made to suffer.

And Michael had cried...

It was one of Lucifer's favorite things to occasionally taunt him with. The fact that he was here being raped and tortured of his own free will.

"Can't rape the willing though. Right Sammy?" Lucifer would whisper.

"Should've taken that blade and cut into Michael when you had the chance. But no. You had to go and stand up for him."

"I think maybe you just wanted it to be like this. You filthy little slut. You wanted all of my attention to yourself. I think you wanted me to use your hungry little holes."

"Just admit you like it. That you want it."

"I'll even still give it to you any time you want it."

"We can go to Michael right now and you can feel free to just start slicing away and know that I'll still give you what you apparently want so bad. It'll be perfect. We can both finally have our revenge and still play our fun little games."

He remembers how pissed Lucifer got every single time he refused.

Lucifer had told him it'd be easier if he broke then too.

Then the next decade had been filled with such intimately humiliating and shameful debaucheries and pains, that he can't even believe that after all this time he can still manage to feel embarassed and ashamed.

But he can feel the burn of the blush creeping up his neck to color his cheeks as his eyes catch Dean's.

He almost forgot for a second that it's not real.

Dean's not here, he's safe, hopefully with either Ben and Lisa like he promised or with Bobby, because Dean sure as heck shouldn't be alone, at least until it's certain he won't try something stupid or suicidal.

Sam honestly has no clue what to think about the last three years that he thought were real, or how to handle finding out they weren't real.

And a voice somewhere inside his mind tells him he doesn't think he can survive if he finds out those years were real, that this is somehow real...

But Bela being here gave Lucifer's game away and now Sam's going to spend the next century trying to figure out if Lucifer did it on purpose or not.

Sam came back to himself just in time to feel himself being hung upside down in the middle of the room.

Which was a truly dizzing position, because he swayed back and forth everytime someone so much a touched him.

And he couldn't reach out to try and control or steady the momentum or direction of the way he swung because his hands were cuffed to a chain around his waist.

He watched as two men moved beneath him to pull what looked to be some kind of deep circular tub or vat that was about four feet in diameter, directly under his head.

It was full of water.

After the water stopped sloshing Sam felt the chain holding him up begin to slacken as he was lowered close to the water's surface.

He could hear Dean cursing a blue streak even through the gag that was stuffed in his mouth.

Then the older guy was back where Sam could see him and he was saying "You could be my best pet, Sam. Just let go of all the things you're holding on to. Let me give you the power to cause despair to others. Let me give you the power to make them suffer the way you do."

"You already know I'll do anything to keep others from suffering because of me. You already know you can't make me hurt anyone else ever again. So go ahead. Get this show on the road you soulless son of a bitch." But he had no way to give voice to his angry retort.

His head breached the surface of the frigidly cold water. He hadn't even had a chance to try and hold his breath and now water was being pulled into his lungs as he tried to breath.

He was pulled free long enough for his body to spasm and his back and neck to contort as he wretched and gagged to expell the water.

He managed to get one gulp of air into his lungs before he was plunged into the water again.

Sam tried to hold his breath he really did. But upside down was not a good position for his heart or brain and both decided to rebel and wage war against him, making him take a breath.

But he ended up sucking in water instead of air.

He was pulled out and he heaved and sputtered, he tried to get more air into his lungs but the second he went to breath in he was plunged back into the water, making him get a good lung full.

He struggled against drowning, but there wasn't anything he could do.

He was pulled free again and he weezed and choked before his head and chest were submerged again.

The water was so cold that he honestly had a hard time not gasping each time he breached the surface.

But there was a steady pattern now of when he was dunked into and pulled out of the water and Sam didn't want to risk taking a breath at the wrong time.

Above the surface of the water was getting almost just as hard to breath in as below the surface, because as soon as he was pulled free the water would cascade off of his chest and into his face, sometimes going right into his mouth at random and he had no way to predict it or keep it from happening.

Then there was all of the times the older man would say something, not get the response he wanted, and the guy would get angry.

Those times Sam found himself getting worked over by various implements of pain such as belts, baseball bats and plenty of fists.

Getting dunked into the water after receiving such beatings brought about what Sam was sure was an ugly display of thrashing and writhing, then pitiful pain filled moans of disorientation as he was pulled back out long enough to try to get his breath.

He lost count of how many times he'd almost been drowned.

He vaguely remembers asking Lucifer to just end this game and move on to something else. After all the same things over and over again eventually get to be a bit monotnous

He heard a few of the men muttering about him being a lunatic and he also heard Dean's muffled sobs.

He wanted to tell Dean not to cry.

Because it was okay.

There wasn't anything happening that he didn't deserve...

~0~

When he came to again he was chained back against a wall across from Bela again, this time he had enough freedom to move his head so he tried to look around, even though doing so hurt like hell. To Bela's right, he could see an older woman who was close to sixty, maybe even seventy, chained to the wall and she really wasn't fairing well at all and on Bela's left was a man who was probably in his late twenties and he too looked in as bad of condition as Bela, who'd obviously been through even more abuse since Sam saw her last.

And to Sam's right..

There was Dean.

Dean had obviously been roughed up quite a bit, but at least he still had his clothes on and by the looks of any exposed skin he wasn't cut up,

In this reality that meant he hadn't been.. Hurt.. At least not like that... Right?

Sam hoped that Lucifer wouldn't turn this into a reality where he had to watch, hear or find out about Dean being hurt, especially like that.

Lucifer LOVED those realities, because they hurt him the worst...

But there was blood on Dean's clothes and skin that Sam couldn't see...

~0~

The GLOCK in his face didn't intimidate him.

One, he was a hunter, he was used to facing way worse than a person with a gun.

And.. Two, he had a one and a half story living, pissed off, pillar of ice to back him up.

Except..

Standing behind the guy with the gun was none other than freakin Conrad Lewis..

So much for that backup.

Dean knew how bindings like the one on the Goddess worked. She would have no choice but to be at the mercy of her "Master's" commands.

He was on his own for the time being and any sudden movements could get him a bullet to his head. So he had no choice but to play it smart and do his best to not get killed.

Conrad Lewis was an older, guy and he'd look distinguished, even almost grandfatherly, with his subtly graying hair and mustache, but that's only if Dean didn't already know that the guy was lower than the most vile scum.

Conrad looked over at Dean's shoulder towards the Goddess and gave an evil leer as he said "So, thought you could escape me pet? You're going to have to be punished now."

The Goddess hung her head and Dean could hear the trembling in her voice as she begged "Please, Master.."

Conrad smiled at the Goddess' tone. "You know I won't have any leniency, even for you. Or have you forgotten so easily?"

"No. Master.. I.. I.. Haven't forgotten." The Goddess panted through heaving breaths.

"Well, I think you need a really good reminder." Conrad stated.

Everything about the man radiated pure evil. "How long do you think it's going to take to make you remember not to be such a stupid little slut that still thinks she can somehow be free?! Huh pet? Another century? Two?!"

"How ever long you see fit, Master." The Goddess whispered, it was obvious she was heartbroken by having lost her chance at freedom. Dean wondered how long she'd been hoping for rescue and how many times she had come close to getting saved only to watch her hopes be shattered.

"Smart answer, pet." The evil man still had that cold, menacing smile on his face.

Then Conrad turned to Dean gave him a wide, predatory grin and said "I see you've proven to be an even bigger pain in the ass than the spirits warned me about Mr. Winchester."

At the look of surprise on Dean's face Conrad elaborated "The spirits can be quite chatty. Especially the ones I keep well fed."

So the guy used a talking board and somehow fed spirits to earn information. Great. That meant he could know everything there was to know about Dean, Sam, Garth, Benny and Cas.

"Well if the spirits warned you about me, then I'm sure they clued you in on how bad of an idea it was to take my brother."

"Yes. The mentioned how furocious you could be in regards to protecting precious little Sammy. And now I have to show you what I do to people who want to steal what's rightfullly mine."

"Yours?" Dean growled. "Those children I saved aren't yours. Angie, isn't yours, the people you kidnapped aren't yours. And MY brother, damn sure is not yours."

"That's where you're wrong. They're all mine and I'm not letting them go. The ones that break for me will receive powers to inflict suffering and despair, then they'll harvest all of that pain and all of those emmotions for me to feed on. I'll live another two centuries just off of sweet Sammy's despair alone."

Now Conrad gave a chuckle and said "If he'd just break and give all of that deliciousness over, I could maybe even live another three. But he's so stubborn. I honestly love it when my pets are harder to break. It makes them so much more beautiful when they finally shatter."

Dean stopped caring about the lacky with the gun as he delivered a solid right hook straight into Conrad Lewis' surprised face.

It all made so much sense now.

The bastard was using the Goddess' powers to target certain types of people who were already prone to overwhelming feelings of despair, then he was using the people he broke to create more despair and to harvest all of the hurt it caused.. All so he could extend his own life by feeding off of that pain.

It was the perfect way for a perverted monster like Conrad Lewis to sustain his chosen diet.

Dean wondered where and how the children he'd saved fit into all of this.

Part of him was sure that it was because children would be easier to victimize. Which would have provided a steady stream of despair and pain for Lewis to feed off of for who knew how long.

Dean got another good hit in before the guy with the gun put his lights out. The last thing Dean could think before he went down was of how he'd failed his brother...

~0~

This time when Sam came to the older man, who'd taken such pleasure in having gotten to watch Sam's earlier humiliation, was now harrasing the old woman.

"Leave her alone." Sam demanded with a pained and dazed groan.

The older man merely gave a huff of amusemed annoyance then strode over to Sam and asked "Why do you have to fight it so hard?"

"Fight what so hard?" Sam asked incrediously as he gathered what strength he could to voice his defiance "The Cage or the reality you were sick enough to throw me into?"

The man that Sam was ready to dub as "evil granpa" shook his head and chuckled then moved back towards the older woman.

Sam couldn't rememember a time when he had put a lure on the hook and Lucifer had blatantly refused to take the bait.

This was an apparently new twist to Lucifer's game.

Sam could hear "evil grandpa" cooing lewdly in the old woman's ear about how she was "A bad pet". Because she'd somehow escaped from him almost fourty years ago.

The evil bastard told her how all of her children had been raised as his pets, that her grandchildren and great-grandchildren and so on, had all become either his pets or had been sold to high paying customers all over the world.

The older man gloated that the children he'd sold had made him even more extremely wealthy than he could have ever dreamed. And the ones he hadn't sold had been pleasure pets that were used for many sickening entertainments until he'd either seen fit to dispose of them or turn them into emotion harvesters that would use the powers bestowed upon them to inflict the kinds of despair they had once felt onto other people.

It made Sam feel sick to know someone could do such horrible things to a deffenseless child and he was angry, so angry that children had somehow been made to suffer.

This game had finally gone too far and now Sam was roaring in defiance or wanting to as he growled "You sick bastard!"

But with his wrecked vocal cords it came out as a raspy heaving.

Dean felt helpless as he watched Conrad turn his attention back towards Sam. Over the last three days, he'd had to watch as his little brother was beaten, tortured and raped and he hadn't been able to stop any of it no matter how hard he had tried.

That didn't stop him from still trying though as he fought against the restraints holding him like a man possessed.

Conrad paid him no mind though. He only seemed truly interested in breaking Sam and Ms. Wittiker, all of the others he was victimizing were only there because of their poor luck of fitting the criteria that Conrad's emotion harvesters had been programmed to target.

And since the emotion harvesters were obedient drones that had the powers of a Goddess they could do anything it took to made sure that their Master was kept well fed. Things like becoming invisible, getting in and out of rooms without using doors and without being detected by security cameras, and since there were possibly hundreds of harvesters with the power to inflict despair on the chosen range of targets that explained how so many people had been targeted at once. And how since the harvesters were still technically still humans that had the power to slip into a less corpreal demention, no warding, salt, silver, iron or banishing spell was going to do anything to stop them.

Dean let his mind wonder as he tried to block out Sam's screams as Conrad started shocking Sam with a cattle prod.

He wasn't blocking out the screams to avoid his brother's pain. No he very much wanted that pain to be his own if only it would mean that Sam never had to suffer. But he had to block out the screams when he could, because he had to have enough sanity to help Sam deal with the afftermath of all of this.

And there would be an aftermath, because Dean wasn't going to let his brother get turned into one of those things.

Conrad had paraded one in at one point to show him what he wanted Sam to become. The girl was probably barely twenty, but for Conrad she was probably 'too old' to have held his interest as a pet. Dean remembered seeing how hollow and broken the girl was and knew that she was basically gone, all she was now was an empty vessel for Conrad Lewis to pour his vile perversions into, a vessel that had no choice but to carry that sickness and use it to try to infect others. He couldn't let that happen to Sam.

Dean needed to think.

Garth had given him the first three letters of the Goddess' name.

He knew that she preffered to be called Angie.

He tried out various combinations of letters to follow after the A-N-G in hopes of figuring out Angie's proper name.

Something kept itching away at his skull. There was something he knew. Something he was missing. Some kind of clue.

He ran over the things he knew about the Goddess in his head.

"Okay one. She's made of ice."

"Two. She's a giant."

"Three. The first three letters of her name are A-N-G."

Dean couldn't make sense of what he knew or how it would help, because it still felt like he had nothing.

But he could remember something, about an Ice giantess.. The info had been barely a blip on the radar, but it had come up during research for a case, something from a long time ago.

It was so frustarting!

It was right there at the back of his mind!..

He started wondering how a Goddess had gotten herself into this situation anyway.

Wait. There was more that he knew.

"Four. She was bound and imprisoned." He knew that Angie had been Conrad's prisoner for at least two centuries.

"What could bind and imprison a Goddess?"

"A powerful spell?"

"But then what would be strong enough to perform that kind of magic?"

"A witch?"

"Maybe.."

""No.. Something else.. Something stronger than a witch did this to Angie.. What was it?"

"Who was it?"

"Why did they do it?"

The answers swam just under the surface of his memory.. He knew this.

An ice giantess. Imprisoned because of..

Because of..

Someone was afraid of her power?

Someone was afraid of just her?

Wait.. There was more that he knew.

According to Garth, Angie was the Germanic "Distress Bringer" but she only targeted people who deserved it..

"Like just deserts."

The information had come up during research for the Trickster seven years ago.

He and Sam had thought it might be helpful to know all about any of the Tricksters just in case there might've been some more powerful than others. Things like that were always good to know when it could mean life or death.

One particular Trickster had fornicated with an Ice giantess and thus had fathered three monsterous children.

One of those children had been a wolf..

A Goddess of Destiny had told Odin that a wolf would bring about his death so Odin had bound the wolf with a magic chain, had one of the wolf's sibling thrown into the ocean, the other sent to the underworld and the wolf's mother was "bound" and "gagged".

That ice giantess had been the Germanic "Distress Bringer".

It wasn't that Angie couldn't pronounce her name, she was probably cursed to not be able to say it the second she was imprisoned, then her name spoken properly out loud would be the only thing that would set her free.

He knew her name. But he couldn't remember it. The letters danced in the back of his head.

Something about another name kept scratching away at his mind.

Something about the name of Conrad's hotel, just wouldn't stop bugging him.

"Rodagan." He bounced the name around in his head..

"No way."

"An anagram?"

Conrad did seem like a cocky and smug enough bastard to basically have Angie's proper name written right up over the entrance of the building built over part of her prison.

Now Dean started taking the letters of the name of the hotel and mixing them with what he knew about the first three letters of Angie's name.

"A-N-G-..O-R?.." No. That vaguely sounded right in his head. But it felt like there was both something missing and something wrong about the order.

He wished Sam could help him here. All he'd have to do would be to ask "Hey, Sammy what's the name of the Germanic Distress Bringer. Or what was the name of Loki's girlfriend?"

And Sam would say...

Sam would definitely know the answer. Hell Sam could probably write a five page report on how blank, and blank fits together with blank and blank.

Dean could hear Sam just rambling away about the supposed future the day of Ragnarok was foretold to bring to the land of Asgard.

Dean wished he didn't have twelve years worth of reading comic books screwing with what he knew about reality.

His mind tried to sort through the jumbled letters. No matter what he did the words he came up with neither looked nor sounded right in his head.

He had to be missing something.

Sam's blood curdiling cries broke him from his revelry.

His little brother was suffering and all he had to do to stop it was to figure out a name he already knew.

Dean wondered how Sam could keep from breaking with all of the torment Conrad and his goons kept raining down on him.

He thought about how long all o f the children he had rescued from the basement of the Rodagan would have lasted before they would have become one of Conrad's harvesters.

"Basement."

A lit up elevator button flickered into Dean's mind.

"B."

"Son of a bitch. The missing letter."

Dean took this new information and let it swim with the letters already floating chaoticly around in his head.

"So.. A-N-G.. O-R-A-B?.. No. Still not right."

He knew it was one of those weird foreign names with like back to back constanants.

"A-N-G-.. D-B-O?.. No."

"A-N-G-.. R-D-O-B-A.?.. No. Close but no."

Sam's continued cries of pain made Dean frantic to figure out what Angie's proper name was.. All he had to do was say it right and then he could kill Conrad and get Sam the hell out of this place.

"A-N-G-.." Dean calmed his mind and tried to bring the right combination of letters to the forefront of his mind.

"R-B-." Something clicked in Dean's mind.. that was right.

"O-D-A.."

"A-N-G-R-B-O-D-A." Dean took back what he'd thought earlier when he had been so sure that Angie was just unable to say her own name just because of what the lore said about her being "gagged". Angie's name really was going to be freakin hard to pronounce.

"Angie."

There was a hint there.

"An..j. .da." The "G" was pronounced with a "j" sound.

"Anjrboda." Dean whispered.

If Dean had thought it was cold before, he was learning the real definition of cold now as an artic blast swept through the room and the lights flickered out.

Then there was warmth as the harshly frigid cold was pulled away from him.

In what little dim lighting there was left coming through the barred windows Dean could see ice rapidly forming on the ground.

It moved like a living thing and went straight for Conrad Lewis..

Dean turned his head and watched as Angie stalked menacingly towards the evil man who had held her captive and misused her powers for his own sick pleasures. He hoped that she would take into account how close the man was to Sam, because if Sam got even more hurt then he and the ice Goddess were gonna have a problem.

At that moment Angie turned toward Dean and grinned as she flicked her wrist and everyone's bindings disintegrated. Those who were unconscious and couldn't catch themselves, simply floated gently to the ground.

"Get your brother and the others out of here." Angie said with a kind, benevolent voice as she gestured to Sam. Then her voice became venomous as she gestured to Conrad and said "I'll take care of this scum."

"Make sure it hurts." Dean commanded. He wanted to stick around and make sure Conrad got everything that was coming to him, but getting Sam to safety was his first priority.

"Oh, I will." Angie promised vehemetly.

Dean had no doubt that she was definitely going to keep that promise.

Bela hadn't even needed to be asked. The second she was free she set to work helping Ms. Wittiker and the man who had been chained next to her toward the door that led out of this hell.

Sam was barely semi-conscious, but he was still holding on.

When Dean moved in front of Sam's eyeline Sam smiled and whispered "I still won't do it."

Dean had heard enough of his little brother's delirious mumblings over the last three days to know that Sam thought that he was still some how stuck in The Cage and that everything that had happened was a reality that Lucifer had cooked up as a means of perverse entertainment. He'd also heard enough over the last three days to figure out that Lucifer had tried to get Sam to torture Michael but Sam had kept refusing and that Sam had actually offered himself up to be tortured if Lucifer would leave Michael alone.

So the only response Dean could give to what he knew his brother was reffering to was "I know you won't little brother. No one's gonna try to make you hurt anyone ever again."

Sam gave a sigh of relief, nodded and said "Wondered if he'd ever finally give up."

"That's right little brother, your stubborness outlasted the devil's." Dean stated fondly as Sam's eyes closed out of sheer exaustion.

Dean couldn't blame him.

He did his best to gather his little brother's injured, naked, body into a secure fireman's carry, then moved as fast as he could out the door.

The second he was outside the screaming started again..

Only this time it wasn't Sam's screams or even the screams of any of the others Conrad had victimized.

No. They were the agonized, sobbing screams of Conrad Lewis and all of his present accomplices...

By the time the screaming finally stopped the entire mansion they'd been imprisoned in was covered in a few feet of rock hard ice, the only gap was where the door was.

The door opened and out walked a young, petite blonde woman with an impish face.

"Angie?" Dean asked and the woman nodded.

"I need to make that everyone that monster used my powers to hurt is healed." Angie stated as she walked closer to Dean.

"May I touch him?" She asked.

"You mean you can really heal him?"

Angie nodded again.

"Yes. Please. Help him. Whatever it takes."

Dean manuvered Sam so that Sam rested against his chest facing outward.

Angie let her hand hover over the cuts on Sam's left pectoral muscle with a bewildered look on her face.

The slices had finally formed a sideways "8". Dean figured that with all of the commotion one of the harvesters had messed up on the cuts.

"Infinite amount of strength." Angie whispered as her hand hovered over the symbol.

Dean's eyebrows rose as he took in Angie's meaning, then he looked around.

Bela, Ms. Wittiker and the man whose name Dean still didn't know all had the same symbol carved into their chests and he knew for a fact that those marks hadn't been there before the three of them disappeared.

Angie seemed to sense Dean's confusion as she looked up at him and said "It can be developed over time. But it seems your brother already had it."

Angie ran her hands over Sam's form without making contact.

Dean's quizical look caught her attention again.

"I'm reading his aura as well as his mind. It'll help me find the answers you seek."

Now Dean was really baffled.

"I'm a Goddess. Remember?.. Reading the minds of mortals is mere child's play for a being like me, now that I have my powers back."

"And there's answers you need. Answers your brother and all the other victims of that madman will need. I just figured it would be easier for everyone's mental healing if I could help get those answers."

"Because all I can heal are the injuries of the flesh, I can't do anything to mend damaged minds or souls."

Angie did another pass over Sam without making contact "So much pain." She whispered. "I wish I could take it all away for him.. There's so much that I can't undo. His mind.. His poor soul.. So much pain."

The Goddess had tears in her eyes "But also so much strength, so much love."

She finally made contact by placing her hands on each side of Sam's face, then she placed the lightest of kisses on Sam's forehead and whispered "Heal well, sweet child."

Then Angie looked up at Dean and placed her hands on either side of his face and kissed him on the forehead as well. Angie smiled at his confusion as he felt the cuts on his forehead, left and right temples, right side of his neck, center of his chest, left arm, right arm, right bicep and left hand starting to knit themselves back together. The sensations were painless, yet odd.

Dean had actually forgotten the cuts had formed and the voice had too whispered in his mind all while he watched Sam being hurt. Conrad had gloated that as soon as Sam was broken then Dean would shatter so beautifully for him all to easily. Fortunately for them Conrad had underestimated Sam's strength.

Angie moved around to Bela who now, that Dean looked close enough seemed to be very protective of Ms. Wittiker who needed someone to help her keep standing. It took some coaxing, but finally Bela allowed Angie to do what need to be done for both her and Ms. Wittiker.

The man that had been saved with them was also skittish but Angie had a gentle nature that was easy to trust and soon she was able to help the man as well.

As he felt the last of his own cuts healing Dean looked around and saw that everyone else was also fully healed, then he looked down at Sam and saw that only the now scarred over symbol of infinity remained.

"I thought maybe he needs to keep that one. Just so he'll always remember how strong he can be." Angie stated as she once again knelt beside Dean.

Dean nodded, then something struck him. "I need to get them back to their hospital rooms." He gestured to Sam, Bela, Ms. Wittiker, and the man.

"But I can't just come trapsing out of the woods with four naked people in tow... By the way. Where are we?"

Angie smiled "I told you I'd have answers. And I do. For now what you need to to know is that we are about eighteen miles outside of Atlantic City and your friends will be arriving shortly. They've been looking for you everywhere. It took them quite a bit of digging but they managed to find all of Conrad Lewis' secret holdings and one of those holdings just so happened to be this land."

"How could you possibly know all that?" Dean asked.

"I'm. A. Goddess. I can read the mind of your friend Garth, even though he's over six miles away."

"I always thought Garth was a little too loud." Dean replied with a bit of bitterness as he wondered just where in the hell the 'friends' he'd been counting on had been three days sooner. "I hope they bring some blankets or something."

The Goddess waved her hand and clothing appeared on Sam's naked body, she did it thrice more and the others were clothed as well.

"Is that better?" She asked.

"Much better." Dean said feeling genuinely grateful. "Thank you."

"Well I do owe you a life's debt of gratitude for setting me free."

"And I owe you a life debt for saving my brother." Dean replied with an appreciative nod.

Angie's look turned sad as she said "I was just undoing the damage that bastard did with my powers. The Gods can be assured that I'll have Odin's balls bronzed and mounted on a silver plaque for what trouble he's caused for the day of Ragnarok is soon at hand."

Dean hadn't forgotten that she had her own loved ones to avenge but now he felt nervous that the Goddess was going to be trying to start another apocalypse.

"Don't worry." Angie said with a chuckle "It'll effect Asgard only and none but the truly wicked will suffer."

"Is he gonna be okay?" Dean asked hesitantly gesturing to his little brother who now lay curled into Dean's chest. He was so afraid of some of the other things the Goddess might not have been able to undo.

"Far from it, I'm afraid." Angie replied regretfully, but honestly "At least for a long time to come. There is so much pain that can come from the things I couldn't heal. I'm so sorry."

"I meant his heart and.."

"I healed his heart to the best of my ability, unfortunately there is truly, little I can do for things that occure naturally without either performing spells or going through rituals that would make us both hypocrites."

"Hey! I don't give a damn what it makes us! Do whatever it takes to heal him completely!" Dean demanded.

"Dean." The Goddess looked filled with sorrow "What I'm saying is there would have to be a human sacrifice."

"You can use me."

"It would have to be an infant or very young child."

Dean hung his head and the Goddess put a comforting hand on his shoulder as she said "It would make us both as bad as the things you hunt and neither of us wants that. Your brother wouldn't want that."

"But his heart.. If.."

"I know. And I truly am sorry." Angie sounded so benevolent. "Your friends are here."

Just then Dean heard the throaty rumble of the Impala. He looked over his shoulder to see his baby pulling up with Garth following close behind in his El Camino.

Benny climbed out of the driver's seat of the Impala and said "You are sure as hell a sight for sore eyes brother." as he walked over to Dean.

"We looked everywhere, for you man." Garth said sounding relieved.

Dean felt himself bristle. He wanted to be angry that it had taken so long for him and Sam to be found. Especially since Benny was supposed to have been tailing Conrad Lewis.

Angie put her other hand on Dean's chin and coaxed him to face her and said "Remember, all of the answers you need will come in time. Don't judge with such haste and anger."

Dean got the message. "Calm down and let them have time to explain."

Angie rewarded him with a smile then she looked up a Cas gave the air a sniff and said "Oh. Now I understand. You are his brother"

Cas looked confused "Whose brother?"

"Loki's brother. Or should I say Gabriel's?" Now Angie laughed herself almost to the brink of tears "He always did have a grand sense of humor. Angel of Thursday!"

The Goddess was practically having a fit of hysterical laughter and Dean was wondering if after everything Angie had finally lost it. Then he got it. "Angel Of Thursday. 'Thor's Day. and Loki was supposed to be Thor's adopted brother according to a lot of lores."

Now Dean was tempted to laugh a bit himself. After all this time since his death, Gabriel had still managed to deliver a punchline.


	6. Chapter 6. Part 1.

~0~

..

..

When the light illuminated the darkness behind his lids, he flinched back in an attempt to escape from the source. When he felt fingers prying one of his eyelids up, he tried to swat at the offending hand, but he was too weak to really move his arms, so it came out as a haphazard, flop of his arm crashing back to the bed before he had the chance to make any contact. He hated to feel so vulnerable and the auditory whine that escaped him, made him feel weak and ashamed. But he was scared. He was so tired of these games. He was so tired of all of the pain as he tried to increase his lethargic struggle against the unwelcomed touches.

He heard a gentle voice, whispering soothing reassurances. "Easy. You're safe, Sammy. You're safe."

Then the blackness crept over him again and all sounds became muffled as his consciousness ebbed back into a void of numbness and silence...

~0~

Dean felt so lost. Angie had simply disappeared on him with a promise that she would return and that she would have answers for him when she came back.

Without some sort of buffer between him and the memories of the hell, he'd just watched his little brother endure, he had no idea how to cope.

And as Dean realized that he didn't know how to help Sam with the mental, emotional and spiritual aspect of everything that had happened. He, himself, wanted to just shut down and pretend that he didn't feel the way he was feeling. Which was angry (PISSED actually.), grief stricken, heart broken, guilty and so damn emotional that he wanted to just curl up into a ball and cry.. He couldn't even begin to imagine the rollercoaster of emotions that Sam would be dealing with and he couldn't even imagine how HE was going to be able to help Sam deal with any of them, let alone all of them.

The only thing he could think of was to keep letting Sam know that he wasn't alone and that he'd never have to deal with all the pain he had been going through, alone, ever again.

But he knew that, Sam having dealt with all of that pain by himself for so long was only the tip of the iceburg.

He hated to admit it, but he felt a little bitter about the fact that Sam had obviously kept quiet about whatever abuses their dad had inflicted on him.

And the thoughts of what all those abuses might've been, truly churned Dean's stomach as he thought about the numbers that had been carved into the flesh on both sides of Sam's left thigh, combined with the number that had been carved into Sam's left cheek.

Had their dad raped Sam?

Dean didn't think their dad would have EVER done something like that. But of course, Dean had once thought their dad had been the kind of guy who wouldn't have EVER hit his own child. And now Dean didn't know what to think anymore.

The marks that had been on both sides of Sam's left thigh had represented something unspeakable, that had been done TO SAM.. HIS, Sammy, when he was just a kid. And then Sam had gone through it again in The Cage, but Dean had a nagging doubt that all of the numbers that had been on both sides of Sam's right thigh had ALL represented Sam's time in The Cage. He was almost certain, that at least some of the numbers had represented otrocities that Sam had suffered through 'top side' as an adult.. And just WHO had been the perpetrator that would have, COULD HAVE, violated Sam in such a way after he was fully grown and built like a brick outhouse?

After all Sam was a well built guy who knew how to defend himself. So it had to have been someone either stronger than Sam.. Or someone, who he had been afraid of...

That thought, had Dean's already churning stomach, rebeling in seconds and he barely made it to the toilet in time.

What if their dad hadn't just hit Sam? Of course their dad, JUST hitting Sam was both inexcusable and unforgiveable and Dean would gladly bring his dad back from the dead and kick his ass over 'just' the hitting of his baby brother, no matter how old Sam had been when the hits had happened or what Sam had done to make his dad think that HITTING Sam was somehow justifiable. BUT.. WHAT IF it had been more than hitting? What if his dad had hurt Sam like THAT, when he'd been just a kid, then kept hurting him after Sam turned eighteen?

After all, Sam hadn't graduated High School until after he turned nineteen.. Sam had always hated having a May birthday, because everyone would always think he'd been held back a year, when in fact the only reason it seemed like he was a year behind, was because some stupid policy schools had about the enrolment of kids whose birthdays were after September First.

What if THAT had really been why Sam had left for Stanford in the first place?..

Dean had nothing left in his stomach, no bile, not even acid, NOTHING, after that thought had him gagging on dry heaves that were trying to turn his stomach inside out.

All the times he'd ragged on Sam for going off to college..

"Oh, god, what have I done?" Dean sobbed as the guilt stabbed viciously at his heart.

Turned out there had been just a little bile and acid left in his stomach after all.

He was found about fifteen minutes later, still clutching the toilet as his body expelled what he was sure, was now his stomach lining, or what was left of it.

Doctor Hughes crouched down to his level and asked him if he could do anything to help.

Dean just knelt there in the bathroom floor, feeling weirdly numb as he blinked away the tears that had formed during his body's assault on itself.. Of course there were tons of emotions that had caused at least some of those tears, but Dean didn't want to think about, or deal with, them.

It felt like something inside his throat popped or snapped as he opened his mouth to speak. He found his throat was too raw and abused from all of the violent vomitting to vocalize anything. So he just gave a dazed shake of his head as he tried to curl in on himself.

When the doctor reached out a hand to comfort him, he shied away, without really knowing why... It wasn't like he was the one who'd been...

That line of thought made him think how sore Sam's throat must have been after...

The next thing he knew, the doctor had a hand planted in between his shoulder blades and he was calmly telling him to tuck his chin to his chest and to breath, slowly in through his nose and out through his mouth. Everything else was muffled, blurred and numbed. It was like his mind was offline. He couldn't grasp a coherent thought, even if one had landed right in the palm of his hand. So he let the doctor's voice pull his focus back from the void it had been tetterring at the edge of.

"There you go." The doctor's voice no longer sounded as distant as it had "Just slow, deep breaths."

"What just happened?" Dean rasped.

"You had a pretty severe panic attack." Doctor Hughes replied. "I thought I was going to have to put you in a bed right next to your brother, there for a minute. The two of you sure do know how to give a guy a good scare."

"A... A panic attack?" Dean's throat felt like it had been thouroughly scrubbed with steel wool and it definitely felt like it coudn't handle the incredulousness of his tone, but his stubborn defiance won out as he voiced his objection.

Let it never be said that Sam and John were the only Winchesters with a stubborn streak...

"I know that's not something you want to believe." The doctor stated.

Damn straight.

He couldn't afford to be falling apart at the seams, not when Sam needed him.

Thinking about Sam, made him think about how he had NO IDEA, how to help Sam.

Which spiralled into him thinking about what all of the numbers that had littered his brother's skin, not even two hours ago, had represented.

Turns out there's only so many times a person's body can handle having a "NOT panic" attack as severe as what Dean was currently suffering, without that person losing consciousness...

~0~

When he came to, there was a maternal looking blonde, standing next to his bedside and she was staring down at him expectantly. Like he should know who she was or something.

He gave her a quizzical look as he took in the fact that she was wearing nurse's scrubs and her scrub top had fairies, printed all over the fabric. She looked more like she belonged up on the Pediatric floor of the hospital than down here treating adults.

Then he noticed her name tag.

"Angela." He rasped out. "Wait. Angie?"

"Took you long enough."

"Sorry, you look..."

"Yeah, great thing about being a Goddess, I can change my outfit anytime I feel like it."

"That's more than just a change of outfit." Dean replied with a raise of his eyebrows.

"Yeah, well I didn't think the juvenile pixy look would make for a believeable, experienced nurse, so I changed."

Dean gave her a weak, half-hearted grin. Then it fell flat as he looked over to the bed next to his.

"Is Sam?.." He let the question just hang there, as he didn't know how to ask or what to ask.

All the ways he could finish that sentence...

"Okay?"

"Going to be okay?"

"Doing any better?"

"Still stuck in a horrible hallucination of his time in The Cage?"

"Pissed at me for letting him down?"

Everything he wanted to ask, just felt, wrong, somehow. So wrong that his tongue felt like it was covered in thick, disgusting mold, just from having attempted to vocalize his concern.

Where did he get off, thinking that he had a right to know how much Sam was suffering after knowing that he was one of the MAIN causes for MOST of that suffering?

He thought back to his younger self, the person he had been before Sam had left for Stanford.

He had been 'daddy's good little soldier', obedient to a fault, hardly ever questioning an order, even when there should have been concern for his brother's or his own well being. He had, had it ground into him at an early age what could happen when orders weren't followed. And it hadn't taken any hits, or cruel words.. No all it had taken was the knowledge that he hadn't followed orders and because of it, Sam had almost been killed, that and his father's stoney silence, had been enough to ensure his obedience... But Sam had been a different type of person all together.. What would have John Winchester done.. How far would John Winchester have gone to try to ensure Sam's obedience?

No wonder Sam had once had so many issues with his big brother's blind obedience to their father.

Dean had practically been brainwashed and programmed from the age of four years old. But Sam had, had the ability to grow up stubborn, defiant, unafraid, because Dean had been his shield for most of his childhood. There had only been a short period of time where Dean had lacked in his big brother duties, and it had spanned through the fifteen months of Dean's 'rebellious phase'. That brief period of time had resulted in some of the worst times, and the most violent arguements within the Winchester's small family and most of those arguements had been between Sam and their dad and those that hadn't been, had been between himself and Sam. That point in his life, would have been perfect for his father to have besieged Sam with various types of abuses, it would have been a perfect time to strike fear into Sam's tender heart. As, back then, Dean had willingly drifted away from his little brother. Distancing himself from Sam, putting up walls between himself and Sam, all because he had started to resent being made to stay behind to raise a child that wasn't his, while he was still only a child himself.. He'd started seeing Sam as someone who had robbed him of his childhood. As someone who was ruining his life. And that had brewed a venom so thick and poisonous that Dean could still feel it's effects creep up on him anytime he found himself really angry with Sam...

No during that point in his life, he wouldn't have been very approachable at all, especially for Sam. He had left Sam vulnerable. He had abandonned his brother. And when that moment in time had ended, his relationship with Sam came out the other side as the fractured mess that it still was to this very day. And Sam's relationship with their dad had been, careful and guarded at it's best and explosive at it's worst. And if John had abused Sam in any way, shape or form and Sam had recognized the abuse.. Well it would go a long way to explaining why Sam had started making everything into an argument right around the time Dean's rebelious streak was reaching it's plateau. Sam was defiant and willful, after all. And of course, with everything he might've been going through at that young of an age, he would have had to have been just to survive it at all.

Suddenly he couldn't blame Sam for having never told him about what their dad had possibly done.

Then he started to remember some of the things Sam had said only a few days ago... "Who gets to decide what matters and what doesn't Dean?.. You? Because if it's you then you've already decided a long time ago that it didn't matter, so there. According to you it doesn't matter."

During that that fifteen months of hormonal, teenage angst, he'd said alot of hurtful crap to Sam.. He'd DONE alot of hurtful crap to Sam... But now he was beginning to remember just some of the crap he'd said way back then...

"What you want doesn't matter, Sam."

"Do you think your stupid homework matters when people are out there getting killed by this thing?"

"Why do you care if you fail the class? It's not like you'll ever use anything you learn for something that matters."

"Why would I give a crap if you flunk?"

"Why would dad give a crap if you fail the stupid class?"

"You think anyone gives a crap about a stupid holiday?"

"Like dad gives a damn about your opinion!"

"I don't give a crap, what you think!"

"It's not like anything you have to say matters!"

And so much more..

Alot of it had stemmed from resenment.. But alot of it had also come from jealousy.

Resentment that age and maturity had mostly quelled.

Jealousy over crap that only an angst filled, hormonal as hell, teenage boy would get jealous over.

And now that he was old enough and wise enough to realize the mistakes of his youth, it was too late...

So. Dean just let the unfinished question taper off and clamped his mouth shut. Because he'd been an insensitive ass one too many times already and he utterly refused to stick his foot any further into his mouth.

Angie just gave him a knowing smile, like she somehow knew everything that had just gone through his mind.

Oh.. Right.. She was a Goddess, of course she knew.

There was a twinle that lit up Angie's eyes as he came to that realization.

Yep. She definitely knew.

"He's doing better." Angie replied in a benevolent tone. "I sat with him for a good long while before I came over here to you. I knew you'd want him to be taken care of first."

Dean just gave her a tight nod. He still couldn't bring himself to speak. He had no idea what to say and his tongue felt paralyzed by the shear weight of pure fear. Fear that anything he might say, could come out sounding wrong, could come out in the wrong tone, could come out sounding like he didn't care because he still felt so numb that his voice would surely come out reflecting that.

He began to tremble. Like he was straining with effort to hold up an unbearable weight all on his own... And Sam... God, how heavily had all of this weighed on him? For years, all alone?..

Sam had been dealing with this for years all alone... Oh. God.

Oh god. He'd made Sam think he had to deal with it all alone.

"It's not too late to help your brother start healing, Dean." Angie stated as she gently brushed her hand over his. "You have time to make him realize that he matters. That he doesn't have to carry this weight alone anymore... But you have to always remember this, Dean... You don't have to carry this weight alone either.. In fact, everytime you feel like you want to take on the weight of all of this or anything else all on your own, ever again, I want you to realize that IF you start trying to deal with things on your own and you start not sharing your burdens, however heavy, or difficult they may be to deal with, with your family, then you'll be making your family deal with watching you suffer all on their own and thus the structure of your family will collapse in on itself, as your family begins to withhold their own burdens to simply lighten the load they feel you are carrying, leaving them to think they must deal with those burdens on their own to spare you from carrying too much weight... Do you understand?"

"I think so." To be honest, he was a little confused.

Angie gave an annoyed huff and shook her head in exasperation as she said "When you deal with all of your problems by yourself. You end up shutting out the people who want to help you. Making them deal with not only the knowledge of how you're suffering all by themself, but also making them withhold their problems from you as they don't want to add to your burdens."

"So, you're basically telling me that Sam never told me what happened, because he didn't want to burden me?"

"Because?..." Angie made a gesture that said he should keep rolling with it, that he needed to elaborate.

"Because I kept shutting him out anytime he tried to reach out and help me?.. He knew I was dealing with my problems alone and he didn't want to pile his issues on top of that?"

"I think we've just had our first breakthrough!" Angie clapped her hands and gave a happy little hop. "I knew you couldn't stay completely clueless forever."

Then it hit him, that he'd just spoken.. The words hadn't felt locked at the back of his throat.. And speaking of his throat... There hadn't been any pain.

Oooh, Angie, could be a sneaky little thing when she wanted to be...

Except.. Now he was confused about something and it made him start to feel upset, even a little angry, all over again. "But what about all of the times where I tried to get him to open up to me,after Jessica died?.. He could have told me about.."

Angie held up a hand and stopped him before he could amp up into a rant that could possibly lead to another panic attack.

"I've had the luxury of being able to read Sam's mind.. And I've seen all of his memories, both good and bad... And what I can tell you about the things I know would turn into a long story indeed. So.. I've decided not to tell you what I've seen in Sam's memories."

"What?!.. You said you'd!.."

"Give you answers?.. I did say that.. And you also know that I was reffering only to giving answers about the otrocities that, that bastard Conrad Lewis commited. So. No. I will not tell you what I've seen within Sam's memories."

"Please. I need to.. "

"I know. That's why I'm going to show you instead. It would be a lot easier if there was some sort of visual aid. Correct?"

Dean's whole body seized up in surprise, then he gave a rapid nod saying "Please. I need to know. I need to know everything."

"Okay." Angie said soothingly "It's okay... I'm going to show you everything you need to know.. But ONLY what you need to know. Some of Sam's memories, thoughts or emotions, I can't in good conscious allow you to be privy to.. I feel bad enough as it is with invading his privacy even this much.. But it has to be done. I honestly couldn't see a way around it. So before I take you on this journey I need you to agree that this has to go at MY pace. And that you won't ask me to go past certain bounderies."

"Of course. Anything, as long as I can know, everything I need to know, to help Sam."

"I must warn you that all of the memories that I'll be showing you first, will not be pleasant for you to have to witness."

"I'll be fine." Dean realized his mistake the second he'd made it. "But if I'm not.. I'll make sure to talk about it with Sam."

"You're learning. That's a very good thing, Dean... NOW.. When you start to see something you want to try to stop, you must remember that everything you're witnessing has already happened.. And.. There's no changing the past I'm afraid. The people you'll be seeing and hearing, won't be able to see you or hear you. You will not be able to intervene, to keep something from happening or to try to make something you feel should have happened, happen instead."

Dean nodded.

"You will stay with me. You cannot leave my side for anything. You will go into this, only to see and to hear what needs to be seen and heard and if during this journey, I tell you something, then you must take heed and remember it... As there will be plenty of lessons for you to learn on this journey and it's up to you to learn them.. And don't think that Sam will be escaping having to learn some lessons of his own."

"Wait.. What are you gonna do to Sam?!" Dean practically roared.. Lesson or no lesson, Goddess or not.. If she thought she was going to 'teach Sam a lesson' about anything, then, she had another thing coming.

"Nothing to harm him in any way, I assure you... But there are some things he's going to have to come to realize.. If he doesn't then there will be nothing, anyone can do for him."

"What?" Dean gasped "What are you saying? Are you saying that Sam could?.."

"I know for a fact, that you've heard the expression "Can't help someone, who won't help themselves.".. And Sam reached a critical point of thinking he no longer had a reason to help himself, months ago, Dean. If he can't come to understand that he still has plenty of things worth taking care of himself for, then he will stubbornly continue to allow his health to decline until he wastes away and dies.. So. Do you wish to continue objecting to whatever lessons I might try to teach Sam?"

Dean couldn't do anything but give a shake of his head.

"Good... Let's move on shall we?"

Dean nodded.

"Take my hand. And do not let go again at any time. Until I tell you it's safe to do so. Do you understand?"

Dean swallowed the lump in his throat making an audible 'gulping' noise "Yeah." He whispered nervously as he clasped Angie's hand in his.

"Close your eyes, Dean."

He complied.

There was light that poured from behind his eyelids, it was so bright and intense, that his field of vision was filled with the cream color of his own skin as he brought his free hand up to shield his already closed eyes. Then everything became a red haze as the light began to receed.. Until he was enveloped by complete darkness.

"You can open your eyes now."

Wherever they were. It was pitch black. Like darker than the deepest abyss, black...

"Did it work? Are we?.."

"We're exactly where we need to be." Angie replied with a firm tug on his hand to keep him grounded.

Grounded.. There was NO GROUND!

Only darkness. That expanded infinitly around him. Like he was floating through the pitch black void of deep space.

There wasn't even the reasurrance of a solid surface beneath his feet to give him the illusion that this was nothing more than a really dark room.

And it was quiet.

Eerily.. Freakishly.. Stomach knottingly.. Quiet.

Dean actually felt a little scared.

Then out of the darkness, he heard a sound.. It was faint at first, barely even as loud as a whiper.. But it still startled him to hear it.

It started out as a faint, but steady.. "Whur, whur, whur, whur, whur."...

The sound was lulling him to a place of peace and bliss. It was one of the most comforting sounds, he'd ever heard.

Angie tightened the grip on his hand. "Come. We must go this way." and as she pulled him along with her, the sound grew more and more distant.

But he really wanted to know, what that sound had been!

It was the most beautiful, harmonious, comforting thing he'd ever heard!.. But Angie was pulling him away from the sound too quickly for him to have a chance to wrap his mind around what it might have been.

He was suddenly mourning the loss of that sound, and he couldn't understand why...

Soon his thoughts were reluctantly torn away from wanting to know the source of the mysterious sound as now he was forced to focous on a dim light that seemed to be coming from miles away.

As Angie pulled him closer, he realized, that it was a porch light. And that there was a door.

He knew that door.

It was the front door of a house in Lawerence, Kansas.. A house that hadn't been his or Sam's home since November second, nineteen eighty-three.

"You have to be the one to open the door, Dean. I can't do it for you."

He tentatively placed his free hand on the door knob and took a deep breath to still himself.

It was anti-climatic, when the door swung open to reveal a darkened living room, that looked exactly like it had that horrible night, thirty years ago.

He was filled with trepidation as he climbed the stairs.

This wasn't Sam's memory. It was his own.

He'd woke up and snuck down stairs to steal just a nibble of the apple pie, that had been left sitting so temptingly on the counter, just under the glass dome of his mom's cake plate. Then he'd snuck back upstairs and into Sam's nursery.. Which is where all of his nightly excursions ended up taking him. He'd always had the instinct to want to ensure that his brother was okay.

He remembered hearing a weird noise. It had sounded like a whole bunch of people whispering all at once. And thinking he'd get in trouble if he was caught out of bed at this hour, he had snuck into Sam's closet..

He hadn't agreed to go trapsing down his own memory lane and he started to try to pull away.

Angie held on tight and wouldn't allow him to even budge. "Just wait. Watch, Sam. Look at Sam and Sam only." she stated in a stern tone.

When Yellow Eyes had appeared, Sam's face contorted into a pout, but he didn't start crying right away. Instead his eyes drifted towards the closet door...

There was no way that it was possible for Sam to have known he'd been hiding in there. Sam had been fast asleep when he'd snuck in to make sure his baby brother was okay. Yet Sam was staring straight at where he had been hiding. It was like Sam was staying quiet on purpose. Because he had been in the closet. But Sam had only been six month old.. It hadn't been possible, it just hadn't.

When Yellow Eyes made the cut and started to try to drip the blood in Sam's mouth, Sam had defiantly turned his head away, making Yellow Eyes miss the first go around and after the third try, Yellow Eyes had used his big, bad demon mojo to force Sam to hold still.. Only then, had Sam started crying... Making Yellow Eyes give pause.

Then Sam had gone quiet.. Like he had been trying to..

It couldn't have been possible. Sam had been only six months old! There was no possible way that a six month old infant had been trying to keep his mother or his hidden older brother safe.

Dean tried to not let his heart twist, as he heard his mother's voice in the hallway behind him asking "John, is he hungry?"

Yellow Eyes had just whispered a "Shh." and as soon as Sam and Dean's mom had moved away from the door, he'd proceeded to make another incision on his other wrist and force the blood from the fresh cut down Sam's throat. Which had only taken seconds. The bastard had, had plenty of time to vanish into thin air... The same way, he'd just appeared, out, of thin air. But the yellow eyed bastard had stuck around... Their mother's death hadn't happened because she'd walked in on what Yellow Eyes had been doing to Sam.. No, the coward had stuck around because he'd known she would come charging right back up the stairs the second she'd realized that her husband was asleep in the recliner downstairs.. He hadn't attacked her sooner, because that would have ruined his chance to force his blood on Sam.

"Son of a bitch." Dean snarled as he realized the bastard had always been out to kill his mom all along. If she hadn't come into the nursery, Yellow Eyes would have just set the master bedroom on fire and killed her anyway, Dean was sure of it. It was obvious that Yellow Eyes had wanted Mary Winchester out of the picture. And Yellow Eyes had obviously been wanting John Winchester to go on a twenty-one year long, obession filled, crusade to hunt his cowardly, demonic ass down... But.. Why?... Other than trying to get the perfect leader for his little army, what had Azazel's end game, really been?...

He'd looked at Sam and only Sam, just as Angie had instructed and it had been hard to ignore his mother's scream, andhis father's heart broken cry of "Mary!"

Then he'd followed Sam as he was placed into the arms of his four year old self.

Wait... Dean could remember the horrors of watching his mother die. But he'd never been able to recall having seen Yellow Eyes back then, in fact he'd never been able to recall how he'd gotten from inside the closet out into the hall.. SAFE, from the flames erupting in the nursery.

Just how had that happened?.. Why couldn't he remember having seen The Yellow Eyed Demon? Why couldn't he remember how even as an infant, Sam had tried to defy him? All of it had obviously happened right in front of his eyes...

He was pulled along with his younger self.. But really it was the sixth month old Sam who was tugging him along. The instinct to protect that fragile bundle was just as strong right now as it had been back then.

Dean watched as their dad had scooped them up and got them out of the way of the exploding glass over head, just in the nick of time. Then he watched as his dad had cradled baby Sammy and hugged the four year old Dean close to his chest, while sitting on the hood of the Impala, wrapped in a blanket.

After a few minutes, "Concerned" (More like nosey.) neighbors had begun to flock towards the still in shock father.. They'd crowded around offering help and useless codolences and placations.. But then one man edged through the crowd, claiming to be a parishoner at the same church their family attended. That man had placed a 'caring' hand against Sam's and Dean's faces, then had given John Winchester's shoulder a squeeze as he promised to pray for all of the Winchesters..

Adult Dean, Dean the hunter knew who the bastard was.. But young Dean, baby Sammy and a father who hadn't yet learned what sorts of things lurked in the dark, wouldn't have had a chance against keeping an angel from scrubbing their minds or from planting any kind of crap he'd wanted into any of their heads.

"Son of a bitch." Dean growled as he clenched his free hand into a fist as he tried his hardest not to find the nearest angel blade to stab Zachariah in the face with, just like he had done once before already.

"Remember. All of this has already happened. There's nothing you can change." Angie whispered as she tightened her grip on his hand in a show of support. "It's going to get even worse than this, Dean. You need to brace yourself."...

~0~

Everything had long since faded back into a pitch black void and it felt like he had now been standing in the enveloping , infinite darkness, clenching Angie's hand nervously, for hours...

Then he heard that sound again.

That, steady, soothing, sound... It felt like it was blanketing him in absolute peace and safety.

Once more, Angie tugged on his hand... Again, she was leading him away from the sound. He actually put up a slight struggle against her pull this time, but her strength and insistence had won out.

And yet again, she led him to another door...

This door was Burnt Sienna, it had the number fifteen right above a door knocker that was made to look like a miniture bull's skull that had a brass nose ring looped through it's nose.

Just as he was about to turn the door knob, he heard the sound of a familiar engine.

Not believing what he was hearing, he nearly gave himself whiplash with how fast he turned his head in the direction of the noise.

Behind him, the pitch black void had been transformed into what looked to be midday, in Arizona. Dean recognised the lanscape from all the times he'd driven through the state. His father was scooping a baby Sam out of the backseat of the Impala as the five year old version of himself climbed out of the back, passanger side seat.

He had never known how seriously depresssed his five year old self had looked back then.

God, had his dad been blind or something?!

At only five years old, he'd already had bags under his eyes, of course the dark circles from obvious lack of sleep might have camoflauged them somehow... Because if they were as brazingly visible as Dean was seeing them, then there was no way in hell that his dad could have been so oblivious of how his child was clearly suffering.

But, yep.. He really was that oblivious.. John Winchester just mosied up to the door, while trying to balance a squirmy bundle of what looked to be a now nine, to ten month old Sam precariously on his hip as he fished in his pocket for the key to the room and he hadn't even spared so much as a glance back at the five year old Dean. It was like at only five years old Dean should have just known to follow his dad into the room without having to be instructed.

Hell, if Dean really thought about it, he'd seen lots of five year olds.. Ones who actually got to remain 'just kids'.. FIVE was NOT a reliable age to start expecting things from a child at.. MOST five year olds would have just wondered off, possibly even into traffic.. They wouldn't have stood out in the parking lot staring numbly at the open hotel room door, waiting to be told what they were supposed to do.. John Winchester had no idea how lucky he was, he could have lost one of his sons right then due to his own negligence.

Angie gave his hand a tug, she was trying to pull him into the room where his dad and Sam were.. But, call him selfish maybe, he wanted to know what was going to happen to the sad, lonely little five year old boy who had just been unthinkingly left out in the parking lot.. How would that little boy know what he was supposed to do?

Just then there was a cry from inside the room. It was a discontent, baby Sammy, Dean remembered that sound all too well. Instinctively he turned turned toward the crying. He hesitated to look back at the five year old to see that his five year old self had been moved to action by the cry. Even at five years old, he'd known when Sam needed him and Sam's cries acted like a beacon, guiding a five year old Dean, right where he needed to be.

Inside the room's divider was decorated with plastic cacti and there was a painting of a desert landscape with a huge snow capped mountain in the distance with the words "Mount Eden." engraved into the bronze plague above it... Great. Of course one of Sam's earliest memories would be of Flagstaff. The kid had always loved the way the barren, arid desert and the forest covered, almost alway snow capped mountain, could co-exist side by side. A third grade Sam had once called it one of nature's miracles...

The second young Dean crossed the threshold, baby Sammy's cries quieted and baby Sam reached out to him from where he was sitting on the bed. Well, at least back then Sam had noticed his absence where their own father had not.

What the HELL, had their dad been thinking letting Sam sit on the bed by himself?.. Especially that close to the edge?.. Yeah, at nine to ten months old Sam could sit up by himself, but he could have leaned too far over and toppled off into the floor and landed on his still delicate little head.

It was like their father had been completely clueless of how to handle being a single dad.

Oh.. God.. Their father had been completely clueless of how to handle being a single dad!...

How in the hell had he and Sam survived past Sam's infancy?!..

John, who was shedding his coat and over shirt, glanced over as young Dean entered the room... Then he got this confused look on his face as he looked at his eldest son.. Then his face became horror stricken as he realized his blunder.

"Oh, god.." John had whispered. "Dean, buddy.. Daddy's so sorry." John looked like he was ready to break down and cry as he scooped Dean up into his arms, gave him a tight hug, before sitting him on the bed beside Sam and breathing out a big sigh of relief.

When the Dean of now really took in his dad, he realised that his dad's eyes, had, had bags and dark circles of their own and there were lines of tension, worry, weariness and anguish, etched into his dad's face, making him look hagard.. The look in his dad's eyes had held so much grief and fear that Dean was taken aback at the realization of how scared his dad had been back then. As he realized that his dad had probably been barely able to hold it together back then.

Dean's five year old self wrapped a protective arm around the baby Sam and pulled him away from the edge of the bed and John practically smacked himself in the forehead as he realized yet another of his mistakes.

Then John's cell phone rang.

"Jim?" John answered "Tell me you have more to go on. Other wise I'll be just spinning my wheels here."

John went silent as he listened to, who Dean assumed was, Pastor Jim, speak.

"Okay. Just give me the name of those other two witnesses in case... Yeah.. Yeah.. I got a pen and paper right here. Yeah.. I'll head over there as soon as possible. I just gotta find someone to watch the boys.. You do?.. Yeah. If she doesn't mind, that'd be great. Sure. Call me as soon as you know. Thanks Jim. Yeah, talk to you in a few minutes. Bye."

John took a deep breath as he ran a restless hand through his hair. Then he looked at his sons and gave them a weak grin as he said. "Daddy's gonna have to go to work in a few minutes. But Pastor Jim says there's a nice lady that goes to his church that will come keep an eye on both of you while I'm gone. Okay?"

Turned out present day Dean had been right. It had been Pastor Jim. Now Dean could remember, Pastor Jim had been assigned to a small parish in Arizona up until about three years later, when the old pastor was reasigned to Blue Earth, Montana. Where that demon bitch 'Meg' had killed him. Which reminded Dean, he didn't care if she was Cas' girlfriend or even if she'd turned over a new leaf to help them out, she was still a demon and there were still things that she needed to be made to pay for. Like killing Pastor Jim, Caleb, Ellen and Jo, as well as the time she'd possessed Sam and used him to kill another hunter named Steve Wandell. There was nothing she could do, other than dying a horribly, painful death, that would ever be enough to pay for having hurt Sam. If Dean ever saw the hellbitch again, he was going to ice her, after he made her suffer first. Cas would just have to get over it.

Dean's young self didn't answer his father... This must have been during the four months after his mom's death, that he'd gone without speaking. His dad didn't look offended, just, sad as he clasped a hand on the four year old Dean's shoulder saying "It's okay, buddy. You don't have to talk. But can you at least nod so that daddy will know that you understand?"

The five year old gave no response, he just held baby Sammy and stared at his dad like he wasn't even seeing him.

John gave a snifle and looked like he was wiping something from his eyes as he whispered "Okay, Ace, okay.", then, John hung his head, looking forelorn and miserable, as he moved towards the dresser to grab his ringing cell phone.

"Jim?.. She said she'd do it?.. That's great. Five minutes. Okay, then, I guess I'll be seeing you in twenty. Thanks again, Jim. Bye."

"Okay, Deano. The nice lady from Pastor Jim's church will be here in five minutes. I want you to be on your best behavior and help her out with Sammy. Okay?"

It was like the only word the five year old had really recognized or somewhat responded to was the word "Sammy.", the little boy's face had flickered from blank to remotely aware, but it had lasted only the blink of an eye, before his face had gone blank again, and in that hair's breath, space of time, the five year old had given an almost imperseptable, jut of his chin, it could have very well been an attempt at a nod. And that's how John had perceived his young son's reaction as he placed a hand on Dean's shoulder and whispered "Thanks, kiddo... I'll be home as soon as possible. But if I'm gone past your bedtime, then I want you to go ahead and get in bed without giving Pastor Jim's friend any problems. Okay?"

The five year old gave his father, no indication that he'd heard or understood.

John had just given a sad huff as he said "It's okay, we'll keep working at it."

Then John just sat there holding his sons, humming to them, it was an off key, but still soothing version of "Hey Jude." and John sounded like he was having a hard time not getting choked up as he rocked his two little boys.

That perfect moment in time had lasted all of three minutes, before there was a knock at the door.

John went to answer it, while the five year old Dean curled protectively around the baby Sammy. Dean's present day self was just beginning to remember, just how much he didn't trust letting strangers too close to his baby brother back then.

The woman looked to be about fifty and she had a maternal air about her as she gave the two young boys a beaming smile after John let her into the room.

"Dean, this is Ms. Dorothy. She's the friend of Pastor Jim's that I told you about."

"Hello, Dean." The maternal woman said in a comforting voice. "And this cutie, must be Sa.." Ms. Dorothy had made the mistake of reaching out to place a gentle hand on Sam's head, eliciting a feral growl from the four year old Dean."

"Dean." John's tone was part reprimanding, but also partially amused. "Sorry, Dorothy. He's been very protective of Sammy ever since their mom."

"OH, my.. Pastor Jim said.. Oh, poor boys." Dorothy whispered looking on the verge of tears. She looked like she'd risk getting mauled by the protective big brother just for the chance to wrap her arms around both children and give them a tight hug.

"Dean. Behave for Ms. Dorothy.".. John stated in a stern tone that was eerily reminiscent of the father that Sam and Dean would eventually come to know and fear "And Ms. Dorothy?"

"Yes, Mr. Winchester?"

John grimaced at being called "Mr. Winchester." then he tentitavely looked at Dean and said "Things'll probably go a whole lot smoother as long as you don't try to take the baby out of his arms."

"Yeah, looks like I'd need a crowbar to pry him away." Dorothy replied jokingly.

"If you could keep Dean from tearing you apart long enough to wedge a crowbar between them, that is." At Dorothy's amused look, John elaborated, sounding exasperated "I'm serious, Dean's a biter."

"Go. John. I'll be fine. I do have three boys of my own you know?.. And they're all three grown and have families of their own. So I know how kids can be, especially ones who are protective big brothers." Dorothy stated as she tossed a wink in Dean's direction "Don't worry, John. Your boys'll be fine. I'll look after both of them. I promise."

John gave Dorothy an appreciative smile, whispered a 'Thank you.' then took his leave.

As soon as John was gone, Dorothy looked over at Dean and said "So, Dean, do you like card games?.. Maybe like ,Go Fish?.. I bet you could show your little brother how to play."

The five year old just sat there staring blankly at the newcomer.

"Oookay." Dorothy sighed. "This'll be more difficult than I thought... How about cartoons?... I'm sure you must like cartoons. How about.." Dorothy let her sentence taper off as she picked up the T.V. remote and began to flip through channels "Scooby Doo?"

The five year old gave no indication that he heard.

"No?" Dorothy asked. "Okay... How about.. ThunderCats?.. I'm sure Sammy would like ThunderCats." Dorothy was practically pleading for Dean to be content with this choice.. Probably because there were no other cartoons on at that moment, meaning the "I know kids. I have boys of my own." babysitter was running out of ways to distract an already proven to be volatile, five year old.

Once again, "Sammy." was the only thing the four year old had seemed to understand and he gave the same tiny jut of his chin that he'd given his father earlier. Dorothy also apparently perceived this as a nod and she whispered "Okay then. You can watch ThunderCats with your little brother, while I make you both some lunch. How's that sound?"

Nothing..

"Well. You're both growing boys. And growing boys need to eat. Surely you have a favorite food that you like? I can maybe make it for you, if you can tell me what it is." Dorothy waited, looking hopeful that Dean would say something.

When the five year old gave no response, Dorothy just gave a small shake of her head, took a deep breath and said "It's okay. Pastor Jim said that you haven't wanted to talk for a long time now. But maybe you can point for me?.. Show me what sorts of foods you like to eat?" She suggested as she went to the small kitchenette and rummaged through the cabinets, pulling out a box of macoroni and cheese, a can of SpaghettiOs, a can of soup, a loaf of bread and a jar of applebutter.

She laid out the array of items on the bed in front of Dean and said. "Okay. I'm guessing that since your daddy has these things in the lower part of the cabinets, that these all must be the things you like the best. So.. You get to choose. If you want the macoroni and cheese..." She pointed to the macoroni and cheese. Then you point to it."

"If you want the SpaghettiOs. Then you point to them."

"Or, if you want some soup, with a piece of toast with some apple butter on it, then you can point to this stuff here." She offered as she circled her hand around the soup, the loaf of bread and jar of applebutter.

Then Dorothy stepped back to let Dean choose...

The five year old, just sort of stared blankly at the items on the bed, as if none of them held any intrest for him. But then the little boy did something that surprised even his older counter part.. He took a deep breath and shyly pointed to the SpaghettiOs. Showing a sign that she was slowly earning the little boy's, very difficult to earn, when it came to strangers, trust.

Dorothy had looked simply overjoyed and she even gave a little exited bounce as she happily said "Okay, sweetie. SpagettiOs it is."..

After that the five year old Dean seemed to relax around the maternal woman, but he still wouldn't let her handle the baby.

~0~

Even right after Sam had been born Dean had already started learning how to change a diaper and feed his baby brother and it wasn't because he was made to learn that stuff, no, he had begged, literally BEGGED his mom to show him how to help with his little brother until finally his mom had relented and allowed him to perform small tasks at first, such as throwing away a wet or stinky diaper and letting him help pick out Sammy's clothes each day, she'd even let Dean help rock the baby to sleep.

But then Dean had practically demanded he get to learn how to do even more 'big brother stuff'. Because when Mary had still been pregnant, she'd told her little boy that as the new baby's big brother, part of his job would be to help look out for his younger sibling, apparently she'd had no clue of how seriously devoted Dean would become to that task...

So, Mary had given in, yet again and had shown Dean how to change Sam's diaper, but he could only do it if he had a grown up there to help make sure he did it right, and how to make Sam's bottles and how to feed his little brother, again, only if a grown up was close by as he did those things and all of those things he'd learned how to do before Sam had even turned three months old.

Eventually Mary had, had to teach Dean to read, 'big boy books', because he insisted that he get a turn to read baby Sammy a bedtime story and it just had to be a 'big boy story' with chapters and everything, luckily, Mary had found just the book for Dean, "The mouse and the motorcycle." had everything the four year old Dean had loved, adventure, a touch of danger, but best of all a friendship, where the hero overcame adversity to save the life of his best friend which had an exited four year old Dean bouncing in the chair as he read the most action packed parts to his little brother. Dean's parents had joked that sure Dean's reading to Sammy was the cutest thing ever, but it riled both boys up to no end, making it to where it would take two extra hours to get the boys to sleep after letting DEAN, read to Sammy.. As there'd always end up being a baby Sammy sitting in his crib, getting rambunctous, clapping happily and trying to mimick the sound effects his big brother threw into the story and a four year old Dean who had to be told more than once that he could not stand up in the chair, nor could he sit on the back of the chair pretending it was a motorcycle, no matter how much it made baby Sammy laugh and seemingly cheer.

Pretty soon the nightly tradition of bedtime stories had turned into goodnight kisses, because otherwise the boys never would have gone to sleep when they were supposed to, leaving their parents exausted.. Stories became more of an afternoon thing, that way there'd be a good chance, the two tykes would be worn down by time for bed...

Present day Dean, shook himself from the haze of his own childhood memories that had crept up on him. When he looked around he was still in the same hotel room as earlier, but now it was clearly dark outside. Dorothy was sitting at the small hotel room table flipping through channels as the four year old Dean slept curled protectively around the still awake, baby Sammy.

Headlights filtered through the closed curtains, but the rumble of the engine outside wasn't the Impala's.. A drunken John Winchester haphazardly stumbled into the room, the hagard looking father fished his wallet out, rumaged around till he found two crumpled up twenties and held the money out to the worried looking Dorothy.

Dorothy had put a hand on John's shoulder as if she could help keep him on his feet if he decided to pass out on her, then she asked "John, are you alright?"

"Just spent twelve hours trying to pull info from a demon. Does it sound like I'd be alright to you?"

"Demon?" Dorothy asked, sounding thrown off. "I think you've had too much to drink."

"Nah. I haven't had enough, is what the real problem is." John stated. "Don't think I could ever drink enough to forget the things I just found out."

"Maybe you should go sleep it off at Pastor Jim's." Dorothy suggested. "I don't think your boys need to see you like this."

"No. I need to be with them. Need to be with my boys. Need to be with my baby. Need to be with Sammy." John replied as he clumsily grasped Dorothy's hand, gave her the money and told her that she should get back home.

Dorothy sqawked indignantly as she allowed herself to be unceromoniously, shoved out of the hotel room.

When it was clear that she was gone, John went to the bed where one son lay sleeping and the other still laid wide awake.

~0~

The baby's father looked sad, and the baby didn't like the way he smelled as the father, tenderly caressed the infant's forehead.

Then the baby's father scooped him up with a whispered "Hey Sammy, how about a bath?"

The baby felt off balance and insecure as his father had seemed to have forgotten how to walk steadily on two legs as they trecked into the bathroom.

The father stretched over to turn the knobs, but he only turned one, the one with the line that was the color of the bad stuff, the bad man, with the bad eyes, had made him drink.

The tub was filling rapidly, and steam was billowing from the surface of the water as the baby's father reached into his shirt pocket and pulled out a string with beads that had the thing he always saw in the place called church, only bigger than this one, hanging from the end.

The baby's father said some things in words the baby didn't understand as he dropped the string into the water. Then he stood up, cradling the baby close to him, but the baby didn't feel safe, he felt anything but. And he looked up at his father and felt his face contorting into a pout, he couldn't even cry as he looked up at the face of the person who he was supposed to be able to trust no matter what and thought "You're supposed to love me. You're supposed to keep me safe."..

Just as his father was about to lower his tiny, helpless, body, into the dangerous looking water, there was a voice that came from the bathroom door.

"Daddy?.. That water looks too hot for Sammy."

It was the voice of his big brother. The voice of the one, who knew how to make him laugh the best, the one, who always made him feel safe. It was Dean's voice and he'd always know it, even when he'd gone so long without hearing it and even though he couldn't see Dean past his father's bulk, he reached out for his brother, for the one who would make him feel safe again...

As he had watched his father fill the tub with scalding hot water, present day Dean had gasped out a horrified "Dad, no.".. Then as he realized that this was no mistake on behalf of the drunken man, as he realized what his father had planned to do.. Dean choked on the breath in his throat.. He wanted to scream, to pummel his father for having even having thought about..

Then, there was his five year old self, speaking for the first time in four months and it had been enough to pull the baby's father back from a line, that once crossed, there would have been no coming back.

John looked over his shoulder at his five year old.. The baby, still couldn't see his big brother and he really needed to, needed for Dean to take him from his father's arms..

"Dean?" John sounded shocked to hear the child's voice after so long.

"It's okay, daddy. Mommy showed ME how to do it right."

Then the five year old Dean went over to the tub and put the underside of his wrist to the surface of the water, saying "Mommy said, that if it was too hot for me against my wrist, then it would be too hot for a baby too."

"Looks like your mommy showed you alot about how to take care of your little brother."

"Yeah, she let me be her helper all the time!"

"Dean, do you think you can be daddy's helper too?"

"Really?"

John gave a nod.

"Sure daddy!"

"I think you'll be better at giving Sammy his bath. Do you think you could do that for me kiddo?"

As he was placed in his brother's arms, the baby, finally felt safe again.

As the images receded into the pitch black void, Dean brought his free hand up over his mouth "Oh, god." He gasped. He wanted to bawl like a child, he felt like he was going to vomit, his dad... His dad, his DAD, had been about to..

"Oh god." Dean cried as his stomach nearly revolted, but Angie brought her free hand to his shoulder, just in the nick of time and Dean's rebeling stomach quieted.

"I'm sorry, Dean... But.. I did warn you how difficult that this was going to be."

Dean took a deep breath and nodded. "Wait." He stated sounding indignant. "How come I keep seeing my memories filtering through too?.. I thought we were taking a trip through Sam's memories not mine."

"Dean."

"To be honest.. I don't need wading through my memories to slow us down, Angie.. I know you mean well, but I need to see what all happened to Sam, without any distractions from my own past popping up."

"Dean, you have to understand.. I've been without full use of my powers for over two hundred years.. It's still a bit.. Difficult, to adjust to having them back."

"You mean you brought me into Sam's mind without having a handle on your powers?!"

"Dean, please don't be.."

"Don't be pissed?" Dean interupted. "You brought me in here without knowing if.."

"It's safe, Dean.. I swear.. At no time will either you or Sam be in jeopardy.. If you'll just..."

"Just what?.. Listen to you?" Dean retorted angrily "This is my little brother's mind, not some.."

"Dean. You wanted answers, you needed answers. You wanted to do this. Or do I have to remind you of what you begged Castiel to do?"

Dean's mouth clamped shut for a few seconds, then he hissed "Damn it... Fine.. But if Sam gets hurt.."

"I already know. You'll have no problem with killing me. But, I swear to you, this will not hurt him and your safety will never be jeopordized during this journey either.. Of course, I cannot promise that it won't hurt for you, on an emotional level."...

"Where to next?" Dean asked sounding frustrated. He wanted to find out the things he needed to know so he could help his brother, but he had a problem with staying patient.

~0~

Dean was braced for hearing the sound this time and he refused to let it tug at his emotions the way it was. He had to help his brother and he could not allow himself to get distracted.

Angie met with no resistence this time as she guided Dean through the bottomless abyss.

"Oh, look. Another door." Dean stated venomously as he was still fuming about Angie having brought him inside Sam's mind without having full control of her powers first.

Angie merely gave him an apologetic look as he opened the door.

On the other side of the door his dad was standing next to Pastor Jim and the ten month old Sam was sitting on the steps that led up to the podium.

The four year old Dean was no where in sight.

"Jim, thanks for seeing me." John stated sounding on the verge of breaking down.

"Well, you sounded like it was urgent." Pastor Jim replied. "Where's Dean?"

"With Dorothy.. And.. It is an emergency... It's about the exorcism last night.. About what that thing said about what killed Mary, about what that demonic bastard did to my son."

"John, first thing that you have to learn if you're going to be a hunter, is that demons lie."

"Yeah, but sometimes they tell the truth, if they know that it'll screw with your mind.. And I don't know how I know, but that thing was telling the truth... Jim, last night, I almost.. I almost."

"You almost what, John?" Now Jim sounded very concerned.

"I was drunk.. And I couldn't get what that bastard said out of my mind.. And Sam.. He's just a baby, Jim.. There's a chance that he's still human."

"Of course he's human, John."

"I'm not so sure... I'm not sure if he's even still my son."

"John, What are you saying?.. Of course he's still your son.. Oh Heaven help you.. What did you almost do last night?"

"I thought it would be more humane if I.."

"If you what?"

"I was gonna drown him."

"Oh lord, no.. John. There's no excuse to ever think that doing something like that would be the right thing to do."

"Even if he's a demon, Jim?"

"He's a baby!" Jim shouted.

"I don't know what to do here, Jim!... He could be a demon, laying in wait.. Watching, waiting for the right time to strike." John babbled, sounding dangerously close to lunacy.

"John. Listen to yourself... Look at Sam... Do you really think he's anything other than your son?"

"I didn't used to.. Until last night.. Jim, last night, that demon looked human too."

"Because he was possessing the body of a human, John!"

"Yeah, but what could a demon's blood do to a human infant, Jim?"

"I don't know."

"What if it made him evil?"

"He's a baby, John. He hasn't had the chance to have been made anything yet."

"And if he becomes evil later down the road because of it?"

"John, there's evil people in this world who wouldn't be able to use being forcefed demon blood as an infant as an excuse. There's no way to foresee what Sam will be like later down the road. All I can tell you is that it will come down to the choices he makes in life."

"What if the blood doesn't give him a choice?.. What if he just... Turns demonic?.. He could tell the demons everything he knows about hunters. Good people. Hunters, like Mac, Joshua and you, could all be sitting ducks."

"John. We all know how to take care of ourselves. And you know how us hunters are. We don't let our guards down. Even around one another... He's not going to learn anything that'll be useful to a demon, and anything that he could possibly tell them won't be anything that they don't already know."

John hung his head "I can't keep him with me. Jim.. I can't.. If I let myself love him..."

"John. Are you listening to yourself?.. You're saying that you don't love your own son!" Jim sounded as if he might cry.

"I don't know how to feel!" John roared. "If I raise him and love him and he still turns, no matter what.. I won't be able..I won't be able to handle it."

"And just how do you think it should be 'handled', John?"

"If he turns... Someone's gonna have to take him out.. You know there's no way past that. We're hunters. We're supposed to rid the world of monsters and demons... But I won't be able to be the one to do it. Not if I raise him."

"You sound like you believe there's no other way that this'll go."

"Maybe.. Maybe, because I don't. And I know that if he's not evil, then that's not fair for Sam.. Jim.. I can't keep him.. Last night I almost.. I almost did the unthinkable... Thank God, Dean was there to stop me."

"Dean, stopped you?"

"First words he's spoken in four months was that the bath water looked too hot for Sammy."

Jim gave a tight nod.

"I'm afraid of what I might do if I keep him with me... Jim.. I need someone to take him in."

"What about Dean?"

"He'll stay with me."

"You want to seperate your sons?... They're brothers. Dean lives for Sam. You can see it in his eyes. If you take his little brother away, it'll kill him. Especially after having just lost his..."

"Don't drag Mary into this." John now had tears flowing down his cheeks.

"She's still their mother, John and she wouldn't want them seperated."

"What else am I supossed to do? I love both my boys. Really I do.. I mean, I think I do.. I want to love them both.. But Sam.. I can't raise Sam knowing what I know."

"John. Both of your sons need you and they need each other... What you have to ask yourself, is if you can get past the things the demon said and find a way to keep your family together, all three of you or if you're going to let what that thing said turn you against your son, let what that demon said tear your family apart. John... Sam's not the only one who's going to have to make choices on whether or not to do the right thing.. You're going to have to choose, Dean's going to have to choose, just like every other person makes choices everyday, John, your choices are going to be the foundation on which Sam and Dean will build their own choices, because you're their father. You can choose to give them both a strong foundation, right now or you can lay down a foundation that is unstable... What do you want to do?"

"I want to raise my boys.. Both of them." John wept. "I want to be a good dad. I just don't know if I can. I don't know if I can be what they both need... I don't know if I can look at Sam and not see a monster.."

"Well, first off... you need to stop talking like that in front of Sam." Jim gave a pointed look at the ten month old sitting quietly as if he was listening to and understanding every word being said "And you definitely can never let Dean or any other hunters hear you talking like that... As far as the rest.. Go slow... Figure out what you need to do to raise your sons first.. Don't let hunting become your first priority."..

"Fat chance of that happening, P.J.." Dean growled.

"I'll be here for you when you need help, John. All you have to do is ask me."... Pastor Jim's voice faded into the black along with everything else.

"My dad was just gonna ditch Sam. He was just gonna abandon him." Dean hissed "And there were so many times that bastard had the nerve to trash talk Sam's decission to go off to college!... He almost killed my brother. He almost killed his son! And he had the gull to accuse Sam of being the one that would go dark side?!"

"Dean, I understand your turmoil..." Angie said trying to be soothing.

"Turmoil!... Sister, I passed turmoil and crossed into roasting over open flames ages ago. This isn't turmoil, this is Hell."

"We both know that isn't true."

"Right. This is worse than Hell."

~0~

He was aware of the fact that once he calmed down enough to grow silent, that he could not hear the sound this time, no matter how hard he strained to hear it.. Apparently his anger had frightened the source of the sound away.

He felt forelorn as Angie tugged him along this time. He really could use the comfort of that sound right now...

The door Angie brought him to this time was gray and had a stainless steel number nine... Dean was at a loss as he didn't know when or where he was.

Shrugging, Dean turned the knob. Inside it was a sparsley furnished cabin.. Honestly he could be anywhere at anytime, he'd lost count of how many cabins his dad had rented for them to stay in when they were growing up.

What looked to be a three to four year old Sam, was sitting on the sofa as their dad rattled off a list of instructions for an eight year old Dean to follow. Then there was a knock on the door and John welcomed in a man who was about six-two and stacked with muscle.

"Dean, this is Timothy Ford. He does the same kind of work I do and he's gonna stay with you and Sam for the week that I'm gonna be away."

The eight year old Dean stood as tall as he could and reached a hand out to introduce himself "Hi, I'm Dean."

Timothy shook Dean's hand and exclaimed "Whoa, quite the grip for a little guy!"

Dean beamed at the praise and John gave a grin and chuckled as he gave Timothy a tap to the shoulder and said "I'm not leavin till tomorrow. So, I figured, that since you were good enough to come out and watch the boys for me, I could buy you a few rounds at the local watering hole. We'll even take my car. What d'ya say?"

"Sounds good, JohnBoy... Just let me stow my stuff away and we can be off." Timothy replied, before saying "Wait.. Who'll sit with your sons while we're at the bar?"

"Dean's already used to watching Sam for a few hours at a time when I need him to... And he does a real good job too." John was sure to add as he ruffled the eight year old Dean's hair. "Okay, Ace.. You know the drill."

"Yes, sir." The eight year old Dean replied boastfully. Then he watched his dad and the other hunter, Timothy, leave for the bar.

The four year old Sam seemed to be pouting when the eight year old plopped onto the couch next to him.

"Hey, what's the poopoo face for?" The eight year old asked in a tone that said he was trying to razz his little brother.. Well, it is what big brothers do.

"I don't have a poopoo face, Dean!" The four year old retaliated. "I'm sad."

Now, the eight year old Dean cooled his jets. Taking care of Sam, keeping him safe, helping keep him happy was his job as a big brother. "What about, Sammy?"

"Dad said he was going to the watering hole. Again.. Why does he always go there? We have water here." The four year old pouted.

"Sammy, when dad says he going to the watering hole, that's a kid friendly way to say that he's going out to a.. To drink stuff that's for grown ups only."

"Oh." The four year old replied with a sad sigh. "But why does he have to go? He has plenty of grown up drinks here."

"Maybe the grown up stuff tastes better at the places dad goes." Dean suggested.

Sam gave a tiny shrug and said "I wish dad didn't have to work this week. I don't like it when he goes away. I don't like when he leaves us alone."

"Hey. We won't be alone though, pip-squeak. Dad said that Timothy guy was gonna stay with us."

"I don't like him. I wish Bobby or Pasture Jim could stay with us instead."

"It's Pastor Jim, Sammy and both he and Bobby were busy. Besides, dad says that you gotta start learning that you can't always have your way."

"I never have my way." The four year old pouted. And yeah even present day Dean could feel the sting from that.. But in all honesty.. Sam really wasn't exactly wrong, at least when it came to their dad.. Either boy getting their way, when it came to their dad, was a rare event in the Winchester household.. Sam was just understanding that sooner than his big brother had... But the eight year old Dean had taken the sting personally.. He gave Sammy everything and his kid brother was whining that he never got his way?

"You always get your way." The eight year old huffed angrily "Cause you're a spoiled little brat!"

This led to a very upset four year old who ran to his bed and threw himself up onto it face first as he started to bawl... Like.. Well, like a four year old kid, who'd just had his heart broken by mean words said by the person he loved best in all the world.

Dean wanted to take his eight year old self and turn the mean little jackass he was back then over his knee.. But then, how would THAT work exactly?

The four year old Sam, eventually cried himself to sleep and the eight year old big brother hadn't yet tried to apologize, not even once.. Instead his eight year old self wandered outside.. Which was a huge 'no no'.. But apparently this was before the Shtriga, before his eight year old self had learned how easily not following his dad's orders could get Sam killed...

There wasn't much outside. Just alot of trees for as far as the eyes could see and what looked to be an old treehouse, that the then eight year old had been dying to explore, but his dad wouldn't let him anywhere near it.. Of course, that's because Sammy always followed him EVERYWHERE and Sammy was too little to go climbing around on something like that.

But if he could go out there by himeself, without Sammy... Maybe his dad wouldn't mind so much?

Who was he kidding?.. There was no way he could get even half a second without the little creep stuck up under him... Unless Sammy was asleep. Like, right now?.. But it was dark outside.. AND, he was in the middle of the woods. He might be only eight, but he's not stupid.

Maybe... Maybe after his dad left tomorrow?.. Maybe, Timothy wouldn't mind keeping Sammy out of his hair so he could play in the treehouse?.. After all, sometimes Bobby or Pastor Jim would get Sam busy coloring or watching cartoons so he could go outside and and do stuff that Sam was still too little for, like playing basketball with some of the boys who went to Pastor Jim's church or picking through scrap heaps at Bobby's, while pretending that he was picking out the parts to build his own car from the chassis up.

Present day Dean wondered what this had to do with what had happened to Sam... Yeah, he'd hurt Sam's feelings, but he was like eight at the time.. Surely present day Sam understood that they'd both been just kids, back then?.. Surely, this wasn't what one of those marks that told of how much heart break, Sam had suffered through, represented?

Present day Dean saw light filtering through the woods and could hear the tell, tale rumble of the Impala's engine coming up the dirt road.

Aparrently his eight year old self also noticed these things as he huridly stepped back into the cabin, closing the door and re-doing the salt line at the entry way before throwing himself into the bed beside Sam and pretended to be asleep.

His eight year old self was aware of his dad stumbling into the cabin, and he cracked open his eyes. His dad didn't seem too drunk, just buzzed enough to forget which way was left or right. But Timothy.. timothy was wasted, when the eight year old's dad helped him into the cabin and practically tossed him over the back of the couch in an attempt to help him get settled. Which wound up with Timothy sprawled out, half on the couch and half in the floor, but Timothy was passed smooth out and the eight year old's dad stumbled to the bed closest to the door, the flopped into the bed and was instantly out like a light.

Man. Present Day Dean had forgotten how skunked his dad used to get.. And he'd been stupid enough to drive in that condition? What the hell had his dad been thinking?.. He had, had two young boys who were at home (Well, home for however long, anyway.) all alone. What would have happened to the eight year old Dean and the four year old Sam, if their dad had died while drunk driving that night?. It's not like their dad had official documents drawn up that said "In the event of my death, I wish Bobby Singer in Sioux Falls, South Dakota, to have custody of my two sons.".. No.. the eight year old Dean and the four year old Sam, would have been placed into Foster Care. They could have possibly been seperated, most likely WOULD have been seperated.

And it would have come after having a fight with each other, that would have been such a great last memory for them to have of their family, before they were ripped away from each other and thrown into seperate homes... Dean shuddered at the thought of how different his and Sam's lives could have turned out.

Seriously?.. What the hell had their dad been thinking?

Angie didn't wisk him away the second things became muted out. Present day Dean guessed that both four year old Sam and his eight year old self were sleeping. But this was the first time Angie had kept him in a memory that went past a night's sleep.

Was what he was supposed to see going to happen the next day?.. If so.. Why, would Angie, take him to the day before, what he was supposed to see, happened?...

That next morning the eight year old Dean was helping his dad get everything he was going to be needing, packed into the Impala, while a downtrodden looking Sam stood watching them with his little arms crossed over his chest in a show of his stuborness. Oh, present day Dean remembered this one.. Sam was refusing to talk to either him or dad, the four year old had been royaly pissed at both of them, at their dad for leaving, and at the eight year old Dean for what he'd said the night before.

Wow. When Sam commited to something, he really commited. There was no cracking him. No wonder Sam and their dad had wound up butting heads when Sam hit thirteen. The kid was stubborn as heck. The four year old didn't even say goodbye to their dad, which was something he'd never yet failed to do since he'd first started speaking. Boy. That meant he'd been seriously pissed. This had to have been the first 'battle of the wills' as Dean used to call them. Present day Dean actually wanted to reassure his then four year old little brother, that there would eventually be some of those 'battles' that he'd actually win.

"So, Deano... What d'ya wanna do?" Timothy asked.

Aw, man, a babysitter he'd actually liked, Present day Dean remembered this guy now, he'd been a younger hunter, around thirty years old, and he'd been really cool, and he'd let him go play in that old treehouse, he'd been dying to explore, without too much fuss. And best of all.. Without making him let the four year old Sam tag along.

Timothy had sympathized with the eight year old Dean. "You're almost a man now, dude, you shouldn't have to have your kid brother constantly stuck up under you... Go, on, go have fun. I'll stay inside and put half pint down for a nap."

Now the four year old spoke "I'm not a baby. Dad, never makes me take a nap.".. Which was true... Because, well, no one could really 'make' the then four year old do anything.. But if the four year old Sammy, just so happened to fall asleep in the middle of the day sometimes, well, their dad wasn't one to complain, nor was he one to wake a sleeping, known to be cranky, when he woke up still sleepy, four year old.

But the four year old Sam was looking at the eight year old Dean with the biggest puppy dog eyes that he had in his arsenal as he silently begged his big brother to confirm that he did not have to take a nap.

That wasn't going to happen, eight year old Dean wasn't going to risk Timothy changing his mind about letting him play in the treehouse, because if Sam didn't take a nap, Timothy might send him outside to go trapsing after him.. And while he might be able to get away with climbing on the thing because he was old enough, their dad would kill him for letting Sam even think about climbing on it, especially if he was just trying to follow his big brother.

The eight year old looked up at Timothy and said "Well, it is close to his nap time." and he'd then shot his little brother a smug smile over his shoulder as Timothy turned to go back into the cabin, the four year old Sam had just stared at his big brother like he was the worst kind of traitor in the world and whispered "I don't like him, Dean. Please don't make me stay inside with him by myself."

"Sorry, brat, there's a really cool treehouse calling my name." The eight year old replied sounding all kinds of full of himself.

And yeah, the look on the four year old Sam's face, broke present day Dean's heart.. Man... Why did he have to be such a little bastard when he was a kid?.. Well, that was a bit harsh, it wasn't always like that, hell, he'd devoted almost every waking minute of their childhoods, trying to ensure Sam's happiness and well being... Yeah, he'd been a little asshat, with the way his eight year old self had just treated Sam, but he had been only eight years old.. And honestly he'd needed to have some time to get to be a kid without having to worry about raising his four year old brother, when he himself was just eight.. So, what was the point of what he was being shown? It's not like he'd really done anything wrong.. Okay, besides treating Sam like crap, but he had needed a breather away from the kid!.. And, hello!... He was eight!

"Come on, Sammy." Dean begged the scene of a sullen Sam, trapsing into the cabin behind Timothy "You can't honestly be still holding this against me. Dude, we were kids!.. Big brothers are supossed to give little brothers a hard time and vice versa."

But the memory continued and now Dean was inside the cabin with Sam and Timothy and Timothy was backtracking to close the door after the depressed looking four year old Sam trudged in.

"Can't just leave the door open, mini dude." Timothy stated as he shut the door. Then Timothy started messing around with a pile of clothes on the dresser.

"What am I suposed to be learning from this?" Dean asked, sounding frustrated "I get it. I was a jackass for all of five seconds when I was eight years old and I broke my baby brother's heart. Now. Can we please, go to a memory that shows me the really important stuff?"

"You agreed to go at my pace, Dean." Angie reminded him in a reprimanding tone.

"Well, no offense, but your pace is really frickin slow."

Angie gave a shake of her head, she looked.. Disappointed in him... "It'll pick up here in a minute." She replied tersely.

"Okay, buddy, Come on, time for a nap, little guy." Timothy said as he pulled the blankets back on the bed closest to the door.

"That's dad's bed. Mine and Dean's is always the one furthest from the door, no matter where we're staying."

"Yeah, but your dad's not here. So you get to be a big boy and sleep in his bed. How's that sound?"

Sam gave a shrug and climbed up into the bed.

Timothy gave Sam a confused look "Buddy, is that what you wear to bed?"

"It's just a nap."

"No, little guy, ya gotta strip down, so you can be comfortable. You'll sleep better that way."

Suddenly, present day Dean, wasn't liking the babysitter so much any more, but eight year old Dean was outside, living it up in treehouse paradise, completely oblivious to what was going on inside the cabin...

Just like Timothy must've wanted...

"Son of a bitch." Dean growled as he could see from Sam's perspective, the four year old Sam stripping down to just his undershirt and tightie-whities. The kid was four and used to sometimes running around in nothing but an oversized tee-shirt and his undies when... When he was around people he was supposed to be able to trust...

Dean felt like he was going to be sick as he watched the then four year old slip under the blankets, because the second he'd pulled the blankets over Sam, Timothy stripped down to nothing but his boxers.

"No." Came Dean's horrified whisper. "He's just a baby, you monster!" He roared as he made an attempt to lunge at the man, but Angie held him in place.

"What are you doing?" Sam asked in trepidation.

"I'm gonna take a nap with you." Timothy replied as he slipped under the blankets with Sam.

"No, Sam. Get out of the bed and run!.. Run to the door and.."

"You can't change anything that's about to happen, Dean." Angie interupted him sounding full of sadness "I am truly sorry."

The four year old tensed as Timothy rolled towards him and put a hand on his stomach.. Timothy began to caress the four year old's stomach with the tips of his fingers, then he started to take his touch lower, to the waist band of Sam's underwear.

"What are you doing?!" Sam asked in a shout, that could have possibly alerted his big brother, if he wasn't all the way out at the treehouse, that was.

"Shh." Timothy whispered. "Just let me touch you. It'll feel good, I promise."

"No! I'm gonna tell my daddy!" The little boy shrieked.

He started to struggle, but Timothy was a grown up. The bad man just laughed at the little boy as he climbed on top of him and put a hand over his mouth.

"You're NOT, gonna tell your daddy. Wanna know why, buddy?.. Because if you tell. Your daddy's gonna know how filthy you are. He'll know that you're a tainted and dirty, little boy.. And then he won't want you anymore... He'll give you away... He might even give you to me... But hey.. If you still wanna tell... Your brother's right outside. Maybe, I can get your daddy to let me have both you and your brother. I can think of plenty of fun things to do with your brother and I don't think he'll be a whiny baby like you. So.. Go ahead. If you still wanna tell." Timothy panted as he pulled his hand away from the four year old's mouth. But the bad man made no move to let him up. The little boy was really scared.

Dean hated seeing this from Sam's point of view, hated feeling his little brother's fear and vulnerability. "I'm here, Sammy. I'm here for you. You're not alone." Dean wept as he listened to the four year old's frightened whisper of "I won't tell."..

"Good, boy." Timothy praised. "I'll make you like it. I promise."

"I don't wanna like it." The four year old cried.

"Well, you can't always have your way, buddy.. I'm a grown up and you'll do what I tell you. Or I'll call your big brother in and play with him instead, then when your daddy finds out, he won't want either of you anymore."

"Go ahead and call me in, you prick!.. See how you like the business end of my dad's shotgun!" Present day Dean roared. But Angie kept him from pulling away.

The four year old began to shed silent tears as the bad man's touching him, down there, made his private part, start to feel tingly.

"I have to pee." The four year old's high pitched whisper sounded terrified.

"What you're feeling isn't the need to pee, buddy. It's a special feeling that means you like this."

"But I don't like it."

"Yes, you do. Watch. Your peepee's gonna squirt something into my hand, but it won't be pee. When that happens, it'll mean that you're a really dirty little boy who likes what I'm doing to you. It'll mean you want me to do even more."

The little boy cringed as the bad man brought the hand that wasn't touching his private part, up under his jewls, or that's what his brother called them, the 'family jewls'.. But if his dad wouldn't want him anymore. That meant that he wasn't family anymore. Right? So they weren't 'family' anything anymore, they were just jewls, and he wished he didn't have them as the bad man began to tickle them with his fingertips.

The four year old's stomach began to hurt, really bad "I have a stomach ache." he cried.

"It's just a little cramping, it happens to alot of dirty boys the first time they're about to squirt their stuff."

The four year old felt like his guts had just been ripped out of his private part. "Ow! Ow! Ow!" he shrieked as he started to thrash around, his whole body felt all ticklish now, but not the fun kind of ticklish, this hurt, like he had to pee but he was being tickled anyway when he didn't even want to be touched and there were tears pouring down his face.

"I don't like it! I don't!" The little boy screamed.

"Look." Timothy commanded, then he forced the four year old to look at the cloudy liquid coating his hand "Your peepee, squirted, just like I said it would. That means you liked what I did. It means, you're tainted, you're dirty now and if your daddy finds out he'll give you away. So do what I tell you to or I'll tell. I'll tell your daddy what a dirty little boy you are. How you liked it so much that you squirted your stuff in my hand like only dirty boys do. And I'll make sure he gives you to me."

The four year old was sobbing now "It hurt. I didn't like it. I swear."

"Well, maybe your brother will like it better." Timothy moved like he was going to go to the door.

"No!" The four year old shouted "Don't make him dirty too! Please!"

"Okay, kid. Okay. But ya gotta stop whining and lay back down on the bed." Timothy replied as he started to climb back over the four year old's prone body. "It's bad enough that you're a dirty little boy, imagine what your daddy would think if he found out that you're a dirty boy who won't do what dirty boys are supossed to. He won't just give you away. He'll ship you off as far away from him and your big brother as he can get.. You could wind up in China. That's all the way on the other side of the world, ya know?"

The four year old felt like he couldn't move, he was so scared.

"Now, it's your turn to make me squirt my stuff."

"But you said only dirty boys.."

"Yeah, if you squirt your stff while your still a little boy, then, that means you're a dirty boy. But once you're a man, then it's okay to squirt your stuff when ever you feel like it. But I like letting dirty boys, help me. It makes me feel good. Don't you wanna make me feel good, like I did for you?"

The little boy shook his head no and bravely whispered "You didn't make me feel good."

"The way you squirted your stuff says different."

"It hurt." The four year old replied stubbornly.

"Maybe, you'll like it better next time."

"Next time?!" Sam shrieked.

Timothy put his mouth over the four year old's and licked along the terrified childs's lips, before saying "Yeah. Now that you're a dirty boy, you'll need me to touch you and make you squirt your stuff everyday while your dad's gone."

"Yeah, cause you wouldn't have the balls to do this where my dad could catch ya?!... Would ya, you coward?!" Dean growled as Timothy continued to employ his intimidation tactics and mind games against the four year old Sam.

"And you'll have to make me feel good so I can squirt my stuff. Because you're the only dirty boy out here. Unless you want me to go get Dean and make him a dirty boy too."

"Please, leave Dean alone." The four year old cried.

"So, do ya wanna make me feel good? Or do ya wanna let Dean be my dirty boy instead of you?"

"I... I'll.." The four year old stammered "I'll make you feel good... Please leave Dean alone."

"Say it right. You're a dirty boy now. Tell me. Tell me you WANNA make me feel good."

"I wanna make you feel good." The four year old whispered, with tears of humiliation streaking down, his heated cheeks.

"Aww!.. You're blushing." The bad man cooed "That's just too cute... You know that means, you really do like this?!"

Afraid he'll anger the bad man, afraid the bad man will make Dean dirty too, the four year old remained still and refrained from shaking his head "NO.".. Because he didn't like it, and he hated being told that he did. But the bad man was a grown up and the four year old's daddy would believe a grown up before he believed a four year old little boy.

"Okay.. You're gonna help make me feel good now. Remember. I'm a grown up. So you have to do what I say."

The four year old gave a shaky nod as he laid there sobbing.

He watched as the bad man pulled off his boxers. The bad man had a really big private part and the little boy started to cry in earnest. He didn't want to touch the bad man's private part. It had hurt and made him feel sick when he couldn't make the bad man stop touching his private part. But now the bad man wanted his private part touched too and somehow that seemed worse, because, before it had been the bad man doing something to the four year old, that the four year old couldn't keep from happening, there was no way he could have stopped the bad man and he knew that, because he was so small and the bad man was big, he was a really big, grown up, even taller than his daddy.. But if the bad man made him do touching too, then he really would be a dirty boy, because it would be his hands doing the touching.

He sobbed, the bad man was gonna make him touch something that he didn't wanna touch!.. But if he didn't touch it, the bad man would make Dean a dirty boy too!.. He couldn't let that happen to his big brother!

The bad man crawled higher up onto the bed and got on all fours with his private really close to the little boy's face.

"I want you to touch me." The bad man whispered.

His arms felt too heavy to move, but somehow, he was able to bring his hand up to start, sort of.. Petting, the bad man's private part and he hoped this would be enough to make the bad man squirt his stuff, because he really didn't know how the bad man had made him do it.

"You're doin it wrong, buddy."

The four year old's body began to tremble, this was what he was afraid of most. Now the bad man was gonna make him do it the right way. But he didn't know what the right way was. Or how to do it the right way.

"I don't know how to.."

"Shh.." The bad man whispered. "You want this to be over really fast, right?"

The little boy nodded.

"Okay. I'm gonna tell you how to make me feel so good, that I'll squirt my stuff in no time. 'Kay?'

Now the four year old started sobbing even more, but he still nodded.

"I want you to open your mouth and I'll let you taste my peepee."

"No... God, no... Get away from him, you sick bastard!" Dean shouted.

The four year old shook his head 'No' and tried to pull away.

"Don't, tell me no!" The bad man growled. "If you let me put my peepee in your mouth it'll make me squirt my stuff extra fast and you won't have to do it again until tomorrow. Or I can go get your brother and I'll have him make me squirt my stuff twice, just because his baby brother's a little tease."

"Please.. Just leave De.. Alone." The little boy hiccoughed on a sob.

Dean was shaking intensely with rage. Even at four Sam only used the shortened version of his name when he was in serious distress, always when he wanted and needed his big brother most.. And.. That sick son of a bitch had kept using HIM against his vulnerable four year old baby brother!

The four year old was scared, he didn't want the bad man to hurt Dean. But he didn't want the bad man's private part anywhere near his mouth.

The little boy kept his mouth clamped shut and whimpered and tried to shake his head 'no' again as the bad man grabbed a handful of his hair and gave a sharp yank. Then the bad man rubbed his private over the four year old's clamped shut lips. "You just need to open your mouth and take a taste and I'll do the rest." The bad man hissed as he used his free hand to grab the underside of the little boy's jaw and started to force the child's mouth open.

When his mouth was pried open the bad man whispered "There we go. That wasn't so hard now. Was it?.. Now.. Don't bite down. Or I'll have to punish you. Remember. I'm a grown up and I can punish you if you don't mind me." then the bad man shoved forward and something thick, fleshy and bad tasting, pushed past the little boy's lips.

Now, present day Dean began to retch. This was just too much. Watching Sam go through something so horrible as a fully grown man had been more difficult to bear than words could ever describe, but watching, through a four year old Sam's perspective, feeling his fear, his humiliation, his shame, his disgust and his pain as what could only be described as a monster, orally raped him?.. It was the worst thing he'd ever felt, it was even worse than what he'd felt when he was holding Sam as he died in Cold Oak, because at least then, he could hold Sam. There was no one there for the four year old Sam as he suffered through the horror of being so badly hurt and betrayed by someone he should have been able to be safe with.

After it was over and the bad man finally squirted his stuff, the bad man reached over and grabbed a bottle of cough syrup.

Then the bad man poured a little of the medicine into the medicine cup and told the litle boy to drink it. But the little boy knew this was the kind of medicine that was only for grown ups. His daddy and Dean had told him it was because it had stuff in it that made people sleepy and if a little kid took it, they might fall asleep and not wake up. So when the bad man put the medicine cup to the little boy's lips the four year had clamped his mouth shut and shook his head while trying to scoot back and away from the bad man.

"Come on now, buddy." The bad man said gently as he roughly grabbed a handful of the little boy's shirt and pulled him closer "You have to listen to me, cause I'm a grown up... Plus.. I know, your throat's gotta be really sore. Right?"

"Of course it's sore you fucking pedophile!" Dean screamed.

The little boy nodded. He was shaking so bad and he didn't know if it was because of what had just happened or the fact that he knew that it was going to happen again and he had a feeling that next time, the bad man would make it worse.

The bad man was still naked as he tipped the medicine cup against the child's lips and ordered him to drink. Then he guided the child's hand to his bear private part and started to use the four year old's hand to caress himself. "You'll go to sleep, soon. And anything that happens after you're out's just gonna seem like a bad dream."

Did that mean what he thought it meant?... He was just a baby! Present Dean's mind couldn't take much more. How had Sam survived through what that bastard was planning to do?

There was a strange shimmering, like two different memories, from two different sorces colliding.

Eight year old Dean watched as his dad walked up the driveway.

"Got twenty minutes out and got a damn flat and realized I didn't have the spare loaded in the trunk." The boy's father said sheepishly. "Hey. I thought I told you not to play around that treehouse."

"Yeah. But Sammy's inside with Timothy. So he can't try to follow me up here." The eight year old replied from his perch in the tree.

"I didn't tell you not to play around it, because it wasn't safe for just Sam, Dean. I didn't want either of you near it. One, cause it's ancient, the boards are rotted in spots, you could have fallen through and broken your neck."

"Aww, come on dad. I'm okay up here.. Honest." The eight year old vowed as he crossed his finger over his heart.

"Yeah.. Well, the other reason I didn't want you boys near it, is cause all those plants growing around it.."

"So?" The eight year old asked "What about them?"

"They're poison ivy, Dean."

"Aww man!" The eight year old exclaimed sounding exasperated as the boy's father chuckled.

"Stay out here and I'll bring you out some clothes and some soapy water."

"Wait. I have too take a bath outside?!" The eight year old asked indignantly.

"Well, can't have you tracking poison ivy all through the house, Dean, that stuff'll rub off on everything you touch. And you don't want it spreading to Sam, cause you know how he is when he's cranky and trust me poison ivy'd make him pretty cranky."

"Yes, Sir." The eight year old replied sounding mopey.

The eight year old watched his father open the cabin door then freeze in the doorway.

The bad man had kept the four year old closest to the door so he could face the door and make sure no one walked in on them. But the bad man was enjoying, being able to force the little boy to touch him some more, way too much to have noticed the door opening.

The four year old was groggy, because the medicine was beginning to make him sleepy. But he could see the anger on his dad's face and he felt afraid. He started to sob once again. His daddy knew what a dirty boy he was and now he was going to be sent away to China. He'd never get to see Dean again.

"Get away from my son." The four year old's father snarled. He sounded like some kind of viscious animal and it scared the little boy so much that it made him flinch at the tone.

Shaking and feeling shellshocked, present day Dean watched from the four year old Sam's perspective as their dad pulled a pistol from his waist band, the bad man made the mistake of reaching for his clothes on the dresser, as if an attempt to cover himself now would earn him some sort of reprieve. But as he did so the pile of clothes tumbled into the floor revealing a camcorder.

The four year old didn't know what the thing under the clothes was or what it was for.

"John" Timothy tried to sound as if this was perfectly normal as if he could somehow still salvage a chance to walk out of this situation alive "I was just.. It's not what it looks.."

"Get away from the beds, now Timothy." The father stated in an icy tone. Then he looked over at Sam, who was barely still awake. "Sammy. Buddy." Sam flinched at being called 'Buddy'.. And no wonder, almost every other word out of the twisted asshole's mouth had been to call Sam either 'Buddy' or a 'dirty boy'... But the little boy's father misinterpeted the child's reaction.

"It's okay, buddy."

The four year old flinched again.

"I need you to go into the bathroom and cover your ears and don't come out till I tell you. Okay?"

The four year old nodded and stumbled into the bathroom on shaky legs.. But he couldn't cover his ears, he needed to be able to wrap his arms around himself to keep from shaking to pieces, his whole body was shuddering so intensely. His dad had seen, and now his dad knows that he's tainted, that he's dirty and he's not gonna want him anymore.

From inside the bathroom, the little boy could hear the murmer of his daddy's angry voice. But he could still sometimes make out words.

There were alot of bad words.

His daddy bellowed "What the hell were you just doing to my son, you sick fuck?!"

"You got it all wrong, John." The bad man replied beggingly. "He said he had a sore throat, so I gave him some cough medicine, then the next thing I know he's squeezing into bed next to me in nothing but his underwear. I admit that I was gonna nap in the buff man, but I didn't touch your son, not like that. I swear."

"Then, why in the hell was there a damn camcorder facing the bed?"

"Uh." The bad man paused "To make sure there's nothing otherworldly inhabiting the cabin. After all, there's lots of stuff the human eye can't see that can be caught on film."

"Uh, huh." The little boy's father sounded sarcastic "Let's just see what's on the tape then, shall we?.. Wanna make sure there's no monsters under the same roof as my sons... You know what I'm sayin?"

"Yeah. Sure. You go ahead and start up the V.C.R. and I'll go grab us a six pack from the convenience store in town."

"Nah.. There's good brews in the fridge. Come on, Tim. Let's see what's on the tape... Or.. You can just tell me. It might make me feel generous enough to spare you some mercy, if you just own up to what you did and stop trying to bullshit me."

"It was just a little touching." The bad man blurted out, sounding like he was about to start pleading for his life. "It was his idea."

Well, that just sinched it. Present day Dean had already known the guy was a dead man the second their dad had practically caught him in the act.. But now.. The man was probably going to die screaming.

The four year old boy listened to a few more mumbled words then his daddy yelling "Tell, me everything! Did you rape him?!, Did you?!"

There was more mumbled words the little boy could hear, but not make out, filtering through the wall, then his daddy's scream of "You did what to my son?!.. You sick son of a bitch!" There was a loud thud, then his daddy's voice "I'm gonna kill you!"

There was more noises, present day Dean knew that it was someone getting the living hell beat out of them, but the four year old Sam, didn't know that, all he knew was that he was scared...

The four year old flinched at the sound of his father's angry voice "I'm gonna kill you for touching my son!"

Present day Dean recognized the sound of a punch "He's a baby! You sick."

Another punch "Child raping."

Present day Dean knew the sound was from a kick this time, definitely to the ribs, if the sound of that crack was anything to go by. "Monster!"

Their dad's frantic, pissed off, but also terrified, voice resonated through the door and the way his daddy had said that word made Sam jerk violently. Now it was quiet on the other side of the door and the little boy crawled in between the toilet and the tub and covered his ears, because the sudden quiet was scarier than all the yelling and violent noises from only seconds earlier.

He had let the bad man touch him. He had let the bad man make him squirt his stuff. He had let the bad man make him taste his private part and his squirt stuff. What if his daddy thought he was a monster like the bad man now too?

Present day Dean stood there, feeling devastated, wondering what was going to happen next, he was still watching from Sam's point of view and it felt like an hour or more before the door opened and the tear streaked, blood shot eyed, face of their father was looking sorrowfully down at his four year old.

The four year old couldn't move. Any minute now his daddy was gonna tell him that he didn't love him anymore, that he didn't want him anymore and that he was gonna give him away for forever.

But he didn't want to be sent away!

"I'm sorry daddy." The four year old sobbed "I didn't wanna be a dirty boy! Please don't give me away to the bad man!" Then the four year old went on a hysteric ramble of pleading not to be sent to China along with swearing that he didn't mean to like what the bad man did.

Their father's anguish was clear as crystal to a present day Dean, but lost on a panicked, rattled, in shock and drugged up, four year old Sam.

"It's okay bu.." Their dad caught himself, then present day Dean noticed what their dad held in his white knuckled grip. A V.H.S. tape. "He watched it." Dean whispered as he realized how their dad had known to stop himself from calling Sam 'buddy'... To be honest. Dean was never going to use that word again, for as long as he lived, that word was going to remain officially obliterated from his vocabulary.

"It's okay, kiddo." Their dad stated instead.

Present day Dean didn't know how to feel about the fact that their dad had watched the tape.. Part of him guessed that as a father, their dad had needed to know for sure, just what his child had suffered through.. But another part of him, the part of him that was a hunter was sure that their dad had needed to know how painful he should make the death of the bastard who had made the mistake of touching Sam.

"I'm never gonna give you or your brother away, no matter what. Okay?"

The four year old could do nothing but tremble.

"Sammy?" Their dad was weeping, Dean had never seen his dad like this, not even right after their mom died did their dad weep like he was weeping in front of the four year old Sam. "Please, bu.. Kiddo... I need you to believe me. I love you. I love both you and Dean and nothing is ever gonna change that."

"But I let the bad man make me be a dirt.."

"Sam, listen to me." Their dad growled sternly, making the four year old tense up and flinch away "You are not dirty. He was the dirty one. Do you understand?"

"He's four, dad!" Present day Dean bellowed "Of course he doesn't understand!, It took less than an hour for that bastard to mess with Sam's mind!"

"But my private part squirted.."

"Sam stop. Please... Nothing that happend was your fault." Their dad cried, looking like he was barely holding it together.

"He said it meant that I liked it."

"Sam, I said stop!" Their dad roared, the four year old curled in on himself and wouldn't look at his daddy. All he could do was babble "I'm sorry, daddy., I'm sorry... I didn't mean to let him make me squirt my stuff. I didn't wanna like it!" then he started to sob unconsolably for what seemed like forever no matter how many times his emotionally distraught father tried to calm him.

"Oh, god.. Sammy!" Their dad wailed "Oh, god my baby!.. Sammy, I'm so sorry!"

Present day Dean began to unravel. Both his father and baby brother were sitting broken in the bathroom floor of some shithole cabin in some other time, in some other place where he couldn't help them.

At some point present day Dean was able to calm down enough to remember that his eight year old self was still standing outside waiting for spare clothes and soapy water because of something as trivial as Poison Ivy. None of this would have happened if he just hadn't been so hellbent on playing in that stupid treehouse!

Angie gave his hand a comforting squeeze.

He was tired and he hurt everywhere because crying so violently for so long had literally wrecked his body, the four year old had eventually allowed himself to be pulled into his father's embrace, where he started to doze fitfully off and on. He never slipped all the way into sleep and anytime he succeeded in nodding off, he'd jerk awake, afraid to find that the bad man was back and that his daddy had given him away to the bad man and as sleepy as he was, he still hadn't been able to fully stop crying, no matter how many times his daddy reassured him that he was never going to be given away.

The four year old's daddy cradled him to his chest, but the little boy didn't feel safe, no matter how much his daddy kept telling him that he was now, that it was over and that the bad man was gone and would never be able to hurt him or anyone else ever again.

He was lifted into the air and his daddy started to carry him out of the bathroom, then he told the four year old "Just close your eyes, and don't peek. I have to sit you down on your's and Dean's bed for a second so I can grab all the bags."

Apparently their dad hadn't realized that telling a four year old that had just been through what he'd been through to close his eyes and not to peek was not a wise thing to do, because the child was already feeling insecure and vulnerable enough as it was. And present day Dean, didn't blame the four year old one bit for feeling that way. It's not like their dad's constant habit of ditching them for days at a time would have instilled alot of confidence in a four year old who didn't know the truth about why their dad was always gone.

The four year old was scared. Scared that his daddy would change his mind and leave him. So, even though his daddy had told him not to... He peeked...

He felt his breath catch in his throat. The bad man was laying on the floor, not far from where he was sitting!

The four year old started having trouble breathing as he looked at the bad man and found he couldn't make himself look away no matter how bad he didn't want to see all the deep red, bad stuff that was splattered all over, and pooled all around, the bad man. But most of all he didn't want to see the soulless stare of the bad man's eyes.

His daddy looked up and realized his eyes were open "Sammy." He cried in a whisper "I told you not to peek."

"I was scared you would weabe me." The four year old's nose was stopped up from crying so much and it was effecting his speech.

"I told you that's never gonna happen.. Kiddo." Dean could tell that his dad had, had to force the 'kiddo' until it stuck because 'buddy' would forever be sullied for use in regards to Sammy. "Listen, Sammy. He's gone now. He can't hurt you or anyone else ever again."

"But, daddy. He's right there. I can see him." The four year old whispered, his logic couldn't really grasp seeing a body that was never going to move on it's own again because the person it belonged to was dead and present day Dean knew his dad would make damn sure the bastard was salted and burned before anything could get the bright idea to possess him or replicate him, because there was no way in hell their dad would ever let something get the chance to use the bastard's memories and image in an attempt to further torment Sammy.

"His body is still here." The four year old's father explained patiently "But see, when a person dies."

"He's dead?!" The four year old cried as he crab walked further up into the bed to put more distance between himself and the body.

"Yes, bu.. Kiddo. He's dead. Daddy made sure that he can't hurt you ever again."

"You kiwed 'im?!" The four year old gave a nasally gasp.

"Yeah, kiddo. I killed him." The four year old's father boasted, unknowingly making his four year old feel very guilty and very afraid.

"It's my fault he's dead!" The four year old wailed then he started to bawl all over again.

"Hey.. No." The four year old's father whispered, in an attempt to sooth the little boy. "It's not. It's not your fault. He was a bad man, Sammy. He's dead because he was a bad man that hurt little kids. He's dead because he deseved to be dead."

"Do I deserve to be dead?" The little boy asked, he was so afraid. Afraid that now he was dirty like the bad man, that his daddy would want to kill him too.

"No, Sammy." The child's father whispered sounding horror stricken. The father tossed all the bags over one shoulder and gathered his crying child in the other, then he carried the child out of the cabin.

Eight year old Dean was confused as his dad came out of the cabin carrying Sam and their bags.

"Ace. I need you to roll that spare from the side of the house over here to Timothy's car."

"Dad, what?..."

"Timothy's sick and I don't want either of you boys getting what he has..."..

"Oh, dad, no!" Present day Dean interupted. "Sammy's right there! He can hear you!".. But it was too late, his dad couldn't hear him anyway and the four year old Sammy was already convinced that he had "The bad man's sickness"..

"So, we're taking Timothy's car out to the Impala, I'm gonna change the tire, then we're heading out to Mac's."

"Cool, I can't wait to see Caleb!" The eight year old cheered as he ran to get the spare tire. His eight year old self hadn't even tried to question his dad any further about Timothy or how Timothy would get his car back, if he had, he might have put his dad far enough on the spot to actually get an honest answer with the emotional state his father had been in. But the eight year old was only seeing the limited picture, all because he was exited to see his friend.. Meaning the eight year old would remain oblivious to what had just happened to his four year old brother, until almost twenty-six years later, all because he had hardly ever questioned anything...

The four year old was drowsy, but he couldn't sleep, he needed Dean. Dean would make it better. Dean would make him feel safe. Dean always made him feel safe...

The eight year old Dean was having a blast!.. Rolling the tire was fun!... If he could get it balanced good enough, he could give it a push and it would roll on it's own for a couple of feet at a time and the eight year old kept trying to see how far he could make it roll by itself when his dad shouted "Dean! Quit playing around and get that tire over here, now!"

"I never get to have any fun." Dean muttered under his breath as he grudgingly got to business and started rolling the tire to his dad.

Well, maybe Dean had gone through more than one, rebelious phase.. "Man I was such a little brat!" Present day Dean exclaimed. "I went and griped at Sam for being spoiled and there I was doing the exact same thing I yelled at him for!"

Present day Dean was seeing from the very sleepy four year old Sammy's perspective again. He watched as the four year old's daddy gently laid the child down in the back seat.

"De." The four year old begged, but it was a weak whimper and was barely audible to anyone but his daddy.

"He has to ride up front with me. I don't want you touching him right now." The four year old's daddy stated, making the little boy's eyes grow huge as he gave a wounded little gasp, his heart hurt. His daddy didn't want him to touch Dean, because he didn't want Dean to get 'The bad man's sickness' from him. His daddy didn't want him to make Dean a dirty boy too.

Present day Dean knew their dad hadn't wanted Sam touching the eight year old him, because of the poison ivy, but he also knew that the four year old Sammy, HAD NOT known that.

Present day Dean could feel the four year old version of his brother's desperation. The four year old wanted to his big brother to hold him. He needed for Dean to hold him and make him feel safe again.

The four year old Sammy's despair was still ebbing through him as everything faded into darkness once more...

And this time the darkness was more abysmal than ever before...

Present day Dean could remember a week's worth of being quarantined away from Sam, when he was eight. A week's worth of itching and whining and hating that he had poison ivy.. The poor four year old Sammy must have been devastated during that week! Present day Dean realized.

Then present day Dean remembered. Not long after his eight year old self had gotten over his poison ivy, his dad had caught wind of a monster that preyed on children. A monster that was making kids sick enough to slip into comas. And the eight year old's dad, had taken the hunt for that monster, all too personally.

Dean could remember. Fort Douglas, Wisconsin. When his dad had left him to watch the four year old Sammy alone for three days straight.

Now, things mad a little more sense to present day Dean. When the four year old Sammy had begged for the last bowl of Lucky Charms, it hadn't been because Sam was being selfish, the four year old had probably just needed the reassurance that his big brother would still take care of him.

"Bang up job I did on that one." Dean growled at himself.. But now he understood the reaction his dad had, had back then when he'd busted open the door to see yet another monster with it's hands on Sammy.

"You were just a child back then, Dean." Angie said soothingly. "I know for a fact that your brother never once blamed you for what happened."

"Well, I blame me." Dean stated petulantly as he realized that the four year old Sammy's puppy dog eyes that night hadn't been about getting his way, they'd been begging for his big brother to please still love him.

~0~

The journey through the darkness had taken what felt like weeks, this time, when Angie finally led him to another door.

This door was tan and the numbers were on the flat board of the doorway this time. Which meant it was one of those rare moments in their lives where their dad had rented a house.

The number five hundred twenty-six didn't ring any bells for Dean. so he took a deep breath and opened the door.

From Sam's perspective, the Dean of then, appeared to be around fourteen. Meaning Sam was around nine or ten, depending on how close it was to the kid's birthday.

"D'ya think dad'll be back by tomorrow?" The Sam of then asked his big brother. Present day Dean was still trying to get a grasp on how old Sam had been back then. He guessed that unless Sam was immediately thinking about it or he could think back and access his own past self's perspective of that time, then he wouldn't know for sure.

"I need him to sign my permission slip by Friday or else I won't be able to go on the field trip!" The Sam of then continued.

"It's just a trip to a stupid planetarium. If you wanna see stars so bad, then wait till it's dark out and look up. Voila, stars." The Dean of then replied.

"It's Griffith Observatory, Dean. It's famous."

"If it's so famous, then why haven't I ever heard of it?" Dean had retoted.

"How could you not have ever heard about it?!" Sam had yelled excitedidly "It has all kinds of cool meteorites on display and one kid said that there's even a rock that Neil Armstrong, himself, brought back from the moon! AND.. It's only two hours from here!.. How could you not know about it? It's the coolest place ever!"

"Yeah.. Hate to tell you this, but your cool is my lame." Dean had stated callously.

"Shut up, jerk." Sam had replied with a laugh as he threw one of the sofa's throw pillows at his big brother's head.

"Hey, watch the hair!" Dean had exclaimed.

"Why, huh?!.. Cause Miss Kissie face won't like you no more if your hair's not perfect?" Sam had taunted.

"Her name's Miss Kissington and I don't.."

"Dean's got a crush on his teacher!, Dean's got a crush on his teacher!" The nine year old Sam had sing songed as he danced out of his fourteen year old big brother's reach.

Present day Dean knew now, that this was a nine year old Sam whose perspective he was viewing things from. It was around Febuary of ninety-three.. Still a little over two months from Sammy's tenth birthday. Present day Dean was sure of it and his memory of, still NOT a crush, on, his ninth grade teacher had, had nothing to do with helping to give that away...

Present day Dean watched and listened as the brother's ran around the livingroom sofa until they forgot who was chasing who, which led to pointless wrestling and a nine year old Sammy who ended up laughing so hard, when his big brother had tickled him breathless.

There was the tell, tale rumble of the Impala's engine and both boys tried to clamber out of the floor, but they were a tangled heap of arms and legs that were haphazardly floundering as they struggled to get up with out falling back to the floor.

The front door opened and their dad hadn't even spared the impromptu wrestling match a second glance, it had become, just so common place to see them grappling with each other that their dad wouldn't have even been phased unless their had been blood or signs of real anger. The Winchester patriarch had just quirked an eyebrow and asked "You two done fighting over whatever?"

"Yes, Sir." Both boys replied. Sam's reply was more laughter than anything else.

"Okay, then." Their dad had stated "Who won, anyway?"

"I did. Obviously." The fourteen year Dean old boasted as he grabbed his little brother in a headlock and proceeded to scrub his knuckles into the nine year old's scalp.

"Ow. Dean, quit it!" The nine year old complained as he flopped around in an useless attempt to get free... But the kid wasn't really in any kind of distress. He WAS annoyed, though. The nine year old hated always being so much smaller than his big brother.

The nine year old dug his fingers into his older brother's ribs, making the fourteen year old give a startled yelp as he tried to not start giggling, but the truth was, was that a fourteen year old Dean had been just as ticklish as a nine year old Sammy.

"Okay, boys. That's enough rough housing." Their dad's words had been followed by the two boys instantly settling down. "I'm gonna go grab a shower, you boys get this house straightened up, then we'll go to the diner down the road for some grub."

'Yes, Sir." The brothers replied in unisone as they both took to picking up throw pillows, empty pizza boxes, empty soda pop cans and lose papers that were littering the counters, tables and floor, as the wrestling match had reduced the normally tidy house to looking like a hurricane had swept through it.

It had only taken about ten minutes for the boys to get the house straightened back up and for Dean to take the trash out to the trunk of the Impala.. They'd toss the bags in the restaurant's dumpsters, because the trash truck wouldn't run for another three days... As if on cue their dad came from the bathroom and asked if they were ready to hit the diner.

"Yes, Sir." The brothers had replied.

Present day Dean didn't need to know that dinner had been uneventful, becuse he actually remembered this..

When they'd gotten home from the diner Sammy had asked their dad to sign his permission slip... Which he suddenly couldn't find...

"It was right here." The distraught nine year old stated panickedly. The little boy hated it when something of his wasn't where it belonged. He liked knowing that HIS things were in their right places. And he'd left the permission slip, next to his Spelling and Reading homework, right beside his backpack.. Because none of his homework ever went into his backpack unless Dean or his dad looked over it first and if there was something that needed a grown up to sign it, then it went just to the side of his homework, because it couldn't go in his bag unless it was either signed or at least read over.

But his permission slip wasn't where it was supposed to be!.. And neither was his homework!

"It was right here!" The nine year old felt like crying "Right beside my homework!"

"Well, look in your homework maybe it's there." The fourteen year old Dean suggested.

"My homework's gone too!" The nine year old stated frantically.

"Aww, crap.." The fourteen year old Dean stated guiltily. "If they were on the table then I think I threw them away when we were cleaning house."

"Why would you do that?!" The nine year old shrieked.

"It was an accident." The fourteen year old offered up as an excuse.

"You could've looked and made sure the papers you were throwing away weren't important, Dean." The nine year old growled. "Now it's gonna take me forever to redo all my homework!"

"It's not like it matters. We're gonna only be here another week tops." Dean replied. "Failing to turn in a few pages of homework's not gonna make you flunk fourth grade with as long as we're staying."

The nine year old Sam looked at his brother like he was seeing someone completely different person entirely, sure his brother razzed him all the time for the things he liked being lame... But this was the first time Dean had treated something that was important to him, something that he cared about, like it didn't matter.

"It's not just about the homework Dean! Now I won't be able to go to the Observatory!"

"Just get another permission slip tomorrow." The fourteen year old replied with an uncaring shrug.

"And what if dad leaves again before we get home from school? He won't be able to sign it if he's not here and it has to be in by Friday or I can't go!"

"Boys?.. What's all the ruckus about?" Their dad had been getting his stuff squared away in the bedroom, even if it was going to be just an overnight stay, their dad had always had a thing about unpacking his bags and getting everything in drawers or on hangers, where they belonged.

"Dean threw away my homework and my permission slip!" The nine year old cried.

"It was an accident!" The fourteen year old growled at his little brother.

"Dean." Their dad's tone was stern "You should've made sure the paper's weren't important before you threw them away.. Think about if it'd been something I was working on and you'd just thrown it away without looking."

Both boys cringed at that thought, neither of them wanted to see the outcome of that scenario, but the fourteen year old Dean understood now. He needed to learn to pay attention to what he was doing.

"I'm sorry, Sir." The fourteen year old felt thouroughly chastised.

"You should apologize to me, not dad." The nine year old hissed as their dad disappeared into the kitchen.

"I did." The fourteen year old retorted.

"No. You didn't." The nine year old was still crying. He hated to cry in front of his big brother.

"Whatever, brat. I'm not doin it again."

"Dad!.. Dean won't apologise!"

"You little tattle tale." The fourteen year old hissed.

"Are you two still at it?" Their dad asked as he rounded the corner "I thought we settled this?"

"He threw my stuff away and he doesn't even care that it was MY stuff! He won't apologise.. To.. Me." The nine year old displayed with a pointed finger to his own heart. "It was my stuff. He should at least tell ME, he's sorry!"

Their dad released a heavy sigh. "Just what all was it that Dean threw away, anyway? Why's it SO important?"

The nine year old rambled about having to re-write spelling word ten times each, having to re-write out all the definitions to his Spelling words and having to redo his reading homework, which was a two page report on the story his class was reading and how he'd really wanted to go to the Observatory and now he couldn't go, because Dean had thrown away his permission slip and now there wasn't enough time to get a new one signed and turned in.

"Is that, what all this drama's about?" Their dad asked incrediously. "Just redo your homework kiddo and learn to put it back in your bag when your done."

"But.." The nine year old sputtered.

"No buts, Sam. This was just as much your fault as it was Dean's."

The nine year old stood there gaping at his father, then his dad looked down at him and said "Besides you wouldn't have been able to go to the Observatory anyway. It's all the way in Los Angeles and there's no way I was gonna let you go on a field trip to L.A., even if it is just two hours away..

"Then that means I'm gonna be stuck sitting in the auditorium!" The nine year old was very upset.

"So?" The nine year old's dad replied.

"I'm gonna be the only kid in there!' Now the nine year old was panicking. He hated being left by himself..

The nine year old's dad got a weird look on his face like a very scary thought had just popped into his mind.

"When's the field trip?" The nine year old's father asked.

"Friday, the twenty-sixth.. Dad that's next week. That's why the permission slip HAS to be in day after tomorrow!"

"Okay, okay.. Calm down... I'm still not letting you go on the field trip." The nine year old's dad stated. "But, I'll tell you what. Next Friday you and Dean can both skip school and do nothing but watch T.V. and pig out on junk food... How's that sound?"

"Awesome!" The fourteen year old Dean exclaimed. But the disappointed nine year old didn't reply. Doing nothing but watch T.V. and pig out on junk food was something he did almost everyday, and honestly it wasn't as 'awesome' for him as it was for his big brother.. The nine year old was practically sick of junk food and old reruns of Petticoat Junction, that his big brother loved because it was set near a town called "Hooterville." and it opened with three naked girls bathing in a water tower, so it was all the nine year old ever got to watch when his dad was away. Unless there was a Bruce Lee movie on... His big brother would drop everything, even naked girls taking a bath in a water tower, to watch a Bruce Lee movie..

Agrivated that he had to redo all of his homework, the nine year old grabbed his bag and trudged to the room he shared with his brother... It took him three hours to finish all of his homework the second time around, but when it was finally completed, the nine year old slipped it into his bag.. After all, what was the point of having his dad or big brother look it over, if they both thought the work that HE had to do, didn't matter?

The nine year old had just clicked off his bedside lamp and slipped under the covers.. He was just about to drift off, when.. There was a noise from inside of the closet. The nine year old looked over to see a bright gold light, pouring from under the door and he could here a voice chanting in a strange language it sounded like the voice was saying "Con knee la pooh go." over and over again, the closest door gave a slight rattle.. Terrifying the nine year old child...

"DADDY!" The nine year old boy screamed as he ran from the room "There's something IN MY CLOSET!" He shouted in near hysterics.

The fourteen year old Dean had rolled his eyes, but his dad had gone bolting towards his and Sammy's room, nearly colliding with the nine year old Sammy in the hallway as he did so.

"Daddy." the nine year old cried "There's.."

Present day Dean knew that by the time Sammy had reached eight and a half, he'd stopped calling their dad, 'daddy'.. So for the nine year old to be crying out "Daddy" meant the kid was seriously distressed. Of course Dean knew he would've been as well, if he'd seen what the nine year old Sam had just seen.. What had that been, exactly, anyway?..

"Okay.. Go into the living room with your brother. Dean. Put a salt line across the hall's entrance, just in case." Their dad ordered.

"Yes, Sir." The fourteen year old said with a snap to attention.

About fifteen minutes later, their dad was back.

"Alright, kiddo." The nine year old's dad stated calmly "I took care of it.. Now, listen.. I want you to take this." The little boy's daddy handed him a handgun...

"What?" The nine year old whispered, he didn't want to mess with guns.. He didn't like them. Guns scared him.

"It's a fourty-five calliber, Sammy. Anything tries coming out of your closet again and they'll be meeting with the business end of this thing.. Trust me, kiddo. Whatever's in your closet's not gonna wanna mess with you, now. Got it?"

"Yes, Sir... Daddy?"

"Yeah, Sammy?"

"But I don't know how to shoot a gun."

"I'll start teaching you how, tomorrow after you get home from school. For tonight.. That thing's not gonna come back and if it does, just seeing the gun'll be enough to scare it away."

"Okay, dady." The nine year old replied sullenly, he felt like he was walking to his death as he trudged back into his room alone.

"You gave, SAMMY a gun?" The fourteen year old Dean asked in complete shock "Dad, he's just a.."

"He's gotta grow up sometime. I can't have him scared of things in his closet or under his bed.. When there's plenty of real monsters out there in the world, that he needs to be able to know how to fight."

"So.. There wasn't really anything in the closet?' The fourteen year old asked.

"Of course there wasn't really anything in the closet. He must've just had a bad dream or something."

"But you still gave him a gun. Dad, he's nine and hasn't got the first clue how.."

"Don't worry, it's not loaded and I took out the firing pin, just to be extra safe."

"Wow.." Present day Dean scoffed sounding bitter as the scene faded to black "Great parenting skills, dad.. It's a wonder we didn't grow up to be serial killers."

~0~

There wasn't a door this time, instead another scene, materialized around the present day Dean. It was a field, that was surrounded by trees. Perfectly secluded, for..

Present day Dean looked down the field where a row of cans and bottles lined a wooden fence, then he heard his dad's voice "Okay, Sammy.. Steady your grip on the gun.. Get one of the targets, lined up in the sight.. Take a deep breath and on the exhale, just gently squeeze the trigger. Okay, kiddo?"

"Daddy, I.." The nine year old was cut off, by his dad giving him that look, that said he was going to HAVE to learn how to shoot a gun, whether he liked it or not. "Yes, Sir." The little boy mumbled his reply.

The nine year old did exactly what his daddy had told him to. He steadied his grip on the gun. He lined a target up in the sight. He took a deep breath, and as he let it out, he gently squeezed the trigger.

He was jarred as the gun seemed to try to jump from his hands.. It almost jumped back and hit him in the nose... And it was loud, even with ear plugs, it was still, really loud, loud enough to make the nine year old's ears ring.

But worst of all, was that nothing fell from it's perch on the fence.. The nine year old, had missed.

"You're doin it wrong, buddy." The nine year old gasped and looked up at his dad, his eyes growing wide and terrified as he dropped the gun and scrambled backwards, away from his dad...

The nine year old's vision started to go gray, scaring him even more.

"Crap!.. Kiddo... Sammy?.. It's okay.. It's okay.. I'm.. Sam.. Look at me." The voice of his daddy sounded like it was coming from far away. "Sam.. Look at me.. Please!"

"Daddy?" The nine year old was shaking as he was finally able to look up at his dad again "Wha?.."

"It's okay, Sammy... You just... I think it's time you started getting past this.."

"Getting past what, daddy?.. What happened?" The nine year old asked, he honestly didn't know what had happened or why his dad's words had made him so scared.

"Nothing you need to worry about, Sam." Now his dad sounded like he too was calming down. "You have to do it again and this time I want you to hit your target." His dad pulled a bottle of whiskey from the duffle bag on the ground and took a long swig that emptied half the bottle.

"Daddy. I don't think I can do it." The nine year old confessed with a sense of trepidation as he looked down at the gun.

"You can and you will, you have to, Sam. Your brother's getting old enough to come with me on hunts, meaning sometimes you'll have to stay by yourself... So, you need to learn how to protect yourself, from what's out there, cause Dean's not gonna always be able to be there to protect you."

"Yes, Sir." The nine year old tried again, like his daddy had ordered. He did everything his daddy told him to. Steadied his grip on the gun. Lined up a target in the sights. Took a deep breath and as he let it out, he squeezed the trigger and...

Missed.. AGAIN..

"Are you doing this on purpose?" The nine year old's dad sounded like he was at the end of his rope. "Continuing to miss isn't gonna get you out of learning how to use a gun."

"Daddy, I'm sorry. I didn't do it on purpose.. I was trying my hardest, I swear!"

"Your brother's been hitting every target, every single time, from the very first time he fired a gun and he was only six back then!.. So, don't tell me, you're not missing on purpose!"

"I'm not.. Daddy, I swear.. I really did try!"

"Pick the gun up. And do it again. If you don't hit the target this time, I'm gonna spank you, cause I haven't got time for you to keep holding back, now hit one of the damn targets, Sam!"

The crying nine year old did what his daddy told him.. Steadied his grip on the gun.. Lined a target up in the sights.. Took a deep breath and as he let it out, he squeezed the trigger. The little boy started to bawl in earnest when he realized he had missed again...

He cried even harder as his daddy began to unthread his belt from the loops of his jeans. "Daddy. I tried. Really. I swear." The little boy pleaded. "Please don't give me a spanking."

"You wouldn't be getting a spanking right now if you'd just stop wasting my time and ammunition! I know you can hit those targets, Sam!" His daddy yelled as he forced him to stand about an arm's length away.

*WHAP!* The belt across the nine year old's rear made him yelp and jolt forward.. "DADDY, PLEASE!.. I TRIED.. I TRIED.."

*WHAP!*... "DADDY!" The nine year old shrieked.

*WHAP!*... The nine year old could do nothing but bawl his heart out. His bottom was on fire and his heart was hurting, because his daddy didn't believe him.

"Now. If you miss again. It'll be six swats instead of three. Understand?" The nine year old's father growled.

The nine year old began to tremble as he missed again.. Three swats had been really bad.. Now he was gonna get six!.. WHY?!... Why couldn't he just hit a target?!

"DADDY, PLEASE!" The nine year old's shaky sobs were ripping the present day Dean's heart out.

"I TRIED!" The nine year old shrieked as his dad readied to spank him again.

"We're gonna go through the whole box of ammo until you hit a target!" *WHAP!*.. And everytime you miss from now on, you're gonna get six swats. *WHAP!* Three for waisting my ammo!" *WHAP!* "And three for waisting my time!" *WHAP!*.. Do you?" *WHAP!* "Understand?!" *WHAP!*

"YES, SIR!.. DADDY PLEASE STOP!"

"Now. Don't miss again. Or we're both gonna have a very long rest of the day ahead of us."

The nine year old tried.. He really did.. But now he couldn't stop crying.. Couldn't stop shaking and his dad taking another swig of the whiskey, emptying the rest of the bottle only made the child feel frightened. But his daddy had ordered him to pick the gun back up. Had ordered him to hit one of the targets...

An empty box of ammunition and a very sore bottom later, the nine year old was sobbing unconsolably as he fidgited in the back seat of the Impala trying to find a comfortable way to sit on his tender backside...

"Son of a bitch." Present day Dean snarled. "It wasn't Sam's fault he couldn't hit targets!.. It was his first time shooting!.. Everbody learns at different speeds! Dad should've known that!.. He should've known better than to ever spank Sam over something like that!"

Angie tightened her grip on his hand as the scene faded to black. Once again, there was only a transition into a field... But it was a different field this time..

Present day Dean, didn't know where he was or when..

"Sam." It was their father's voice "I've been at this with you for months and you're still not learning a damn thing!"

"That's because you're not taking the time to really teach him!" Present day Dean shouted as he lunged at his father. He'd glady kick his old man's ass, right now, if.. If.. If he could.. But he knew he couldn't because he was seeing the past. There was nothing he could do but watch..

The little boy hated when his dad smelled like alcohol, because everytime his daddy smelled like alcohol, his dad would start being very mean to him..

"I'm trying my hardest. Sir, I swear! I'm trying!... I'm trying.. Please don't give me a spanking!"

"You're ten years old now, boy.. If six swats every time you miss hasn't gotten it through your thick skull yet, then maybe we should go up to ten swats every time you miss.. Maybe then you'll figure out how to not miss."

"No.. Please.. Dad.. I'm trying.. I swear.. Just give me another chance.. Please!"

"Get. Over. Here. Now. Sam." The boy's father already had his belt in hand and the ten year old knew that there was no way he was getting out of receiving swats.. But it still didn't stop him from pleading.

"Dad, please." *WHAP!* "I tried!" *WHAP!* "I tried!" *WHAP!* "DAD PLEASE!" *WHAP!* "PLEASE!" *WHAP!* Pleasepleaseplease.. *WHAP!* "PLEASE STOP!" *WHAP!* "Dad stop!" *WHAP!* OW!.. Daddy.. PLEASE, STOP! *WHAP!* "DADDY!" *WHAP!*...

The ten year old's father tossed the belt to the ground and gave a frustrated huff "I don't know what to do with you, Sam. If you keep on like this, then you're worthless as a hunter." The ten year old's eyes grew wide as the hurt from his father's words flooded his heart. "If you can't learn how to pull your own weight then you'll end up being the reason your brother dies. Can you understand that?"

"Dean.." The ten year old choked on a sob "Could die?.. " He hiccoughed "Because of me?" That thought terrified the ten year old more than anything else, ever could.

"That's right, Sam. So unless you want Dean to die because of you, you need to start hitting the targets. Or else, I'm gonna have to find something else to do with you. From what I understand, Pastor Jim needs lots of help around the church."

"You'll send me away?" The ten year old sobbed.

"I can't have you endangering me and your brother. If you can't be any use at hunting, then you're a liability..."

"Please don't send me away!" The ten year old sobbed. "I'll do better I promise!"

"Better start, now. If you miss again. You get ten swats and then I'll drive you straight to Jim's drop you off and not look back."

The ten year old did everything, the only way he'd ever been taught, he steadied his grip on the gun, he lined the target up in the sights, took a deep breath and on the exhale, he squeezed the trigger..

"I TRIED!.. DADDY, PLEASE DON'T SEND ME AWAY!" The ten year old screached as his dad drug him over to a tree stump.

"Bend over." The boy's father commanded "Put your hands flat down on the stump."

The boy complied. He knew better than to try to get away.

"You're getting twenty swats this time for outright defying me and forcing my hand!" The ten year old's father growled as he reared back to take his first swing.

"Give me another chance, dad, please don't send me away." The ten year old begged.

*WWHHAAPP!*... "PPPPLLLLEEEEEAAAAAASSSEEE!" The ten year old's scream reverberated around the field "I TRIED! I TRIED! I.." *WWHHAAPP!* "AAAHHH PPPPPLLLLEAAASSEE! DADDY STOP!" *WWHHAAPP!* "AAAAAAAHHH, STOP, DADDY STOP!" *WWHHAAPP!* "I CAN'T TAKE ANYMORE, DADDY, STOP, PLEASE!" *WWHHAAPP!* "I TRIED! I TRIED!" The ten year old yelped like a wounded animal. *WWWHHHHAAAPPPPP!* "AAAaaaaaa, AAAAHHH!" The child's screams were choked off by sobs of desperation. *WWWWWHHHHHAAAAAAAAPPPPP!* The little boy couldn't even scream as he lost his balance and fell to the ground curling into a protective ball, his daddy had never hit him, THAT, hard before. His screams were caught in his throat, he couldn't even cry.. He couldn't even breath..

"Get back up." The ten year old's father growled as he grabbed the back of the child's shirt and hauled him to his feet, making the ten year old begin to wheeze as the ability to breath, slammed back into his lungs.

His dad forced him back over the stump snarling "Fall over again and I'll make it fourty swats... Honestly, I should start over anyway for that little stunt you just pulled."

"No, daddy, no.. I didn't mean to.. Please." The ten year old begged in a hoarse wheeze through pained sobs. *WWHHAAPP!* "Please.. I'll try harder." *WWHHAAPP!* "I'll do better!" *WWHHHAAPP!* "PLEASE DON'T HIT ME AGAIN! PLEEAASSE DON'T SEND ME AWAY!" *WWWWWWHHHHHHAAAAAAAAAAPPPPPPP!*

The little boy inhaled a wheezing breath and started to choke as a scream was ripped from his throat.

*WWHHAAPP!*

He could only sob and fight to breath, he felt so weak, why did his daddy hate him?

*WWHHAAPP!*

*WWHHAAPP!*

*WWHHAAPP!*

Maybe, if he could just keep from screaming?.. If he could just take the rest of his punishment like a man, then his daddy wouldn't be so mad at him anymore?

*WWHHAAPP!*

His body was shaking violently, he'd lost count... Had his daddy decided to start over after all? He couldn't take much more, if it didn't end soon, the little boy was certain he would pass out from the pain and he wasn't sure if his daddy would even care to stop.

*WWWWHHHHAAAAAPPPP!*

"AAAhhh... AAAHHH!" The ten year old yelped, now he really did sound like a wounded animal.

*WWWWWWWHHHHHHAAAAAAAAAAPPPPPPPP!*

"DAAADDDYYYPPPPLLLLEEEEAAASSSSEEE! I'MSORRY!"

*WWWWWWWHHHHHHAAAAAAAAAAPPPPPPPP!*

"I'MSORRYI'MSORRYI'MSORRY.. I'MSORRYDADDDYYYYPPPLLLLEEEEAAASSSEEEI'MSORRRYYY!"

*WWWWWWWHHHHHHAAAAAAAAAAPPPPPPPP!*

"I'msorrryI'msorrryI'msorrry.. Daddypleasestop,pleaseI'msorry." The ten year old whimpered, he could hardly keep his shaky body from crumpling to the ground.

He could hear the belt being thrown to the ground. "You have till the end of the week to hit a target, boy. If by Friday, you don't hit a target, then, the next time I pick up this belt, I won't stop swinging."

The ten year old was shaking so hard that he could barely stand as his father snapped "Get this crap packed up and get your ass back in the car! NOW!"

The little boy was trembling so violently, it made his teeth chatter as he tentatively began to pack away the gun and the ammunition... He moved as fast as his aching body would let him and when he got to the car, he started to weep... There was no possible way he was gonna be able to sit down.

"You can lay down in the back, till we get home." It was rare that his dad showed him any kindness anymore, at least when they were alone, but the little boy wasn't about to look a gift horse in the mouth.

It was dark when they reached home, which was a run down abandonned house, present day Dean cursed his fourteen year old self for not seeing the pain his ten year old brother was obviously in, but his fourteen year old self was too busy reciting the list of chores he still had to do and didn't really spare a look in Sam's direction.. The fourteen year old Dean had thought his little brother was as safe with their dad as he would've been with him, so he was oblivious to the abuse that had happened right under his nose.

"Make sure they all get done tomorrow, make Sam help you, even with the harder stuff. He needs to start learning how to pull his own weight around here, anyway."

"Yes, Sir." The fourteen year old replied.

"Go ahead and get in bed both of you... Tomorrow's another early day of trying to teach Sammy how to aim a damn gun." Their dad grouched.

"Oh, you son of a bitch." Present day Dean hissed "You call what you were just doing to him, teaching him how to aim a gun?!"... What he'd just witnessed was clearly abuse, plain and simple... Why, hadn't the numbers all over Sam's skin represented any of what he'd just seen?.. Wasn't one of those sets of numbers supposed to catalog each time Sam was struck by his father?.. Why was the count off? Because that was a hell of alot more than twice!

"Dean. You and I both know that not all of those numbers had been completed when Sam was taken.. And your brother's stubborn, he fought tooth and nail to keep from being made to relive some of these things." Angie told him with a comforting squeeze of his hand.

The scene didn't change only grayed out and muted a bit, present day Dean guessed that his fourteen year old self and the ten year old Sammy were both sleeping.

Suddenly, there was a flash of red. The little boy's heart started to beat really fast. He could see his brother's Amulet and green eyes filled with pain... He could hear someone screaming and knew it was his big brother... Then he could see his big brother writhing around on the floor, he could hear his big brother screaming... Something was ripping Dean apart!.. But he couldn't see what it was... He could only watch and scream with his big brother as Dean's stomach was ripped with bloody gashes that appeared from thin air.. He could hear the monster growling, but he couldn't see it.. It was invisible... He was watching his big brother get ripped apart by an invisible monster and there was nothing he could do about it.. He was watching Dean die... dean was dying because of him.. He was the reason Dean was going to die...

The ten year old bolted upright with a scream so high pitched, it could have broken glass. But he was still trapped in the dream.

The fourteen year old Dean was by his ten year old brother's side in an instant.

"Sammy. Wake up.. It's just a bad dream."

"Dean." The ten year old sobbed as he opened his eyes to see his big brother, still alive and still unharmed. Even though he knew it was a dream, the nine year old couldn't stop sobbing..

"Come on, Sammy.. It was just a dream." The fourteen year old Dean whispered as he rubbed circles over his brother's back in an attempt to sooth him "Calm down. It was just a bad dream.."

"I saw you die!" The ten year old wailed. "You were being eaten by an invisible monster!"

"There's no such thing as an invisible monster, Sammy." The fourteen year old was exasperated, leave it to his ten year old brother to dream up an invisible monster. "It was just a bad dream... Go back to sleep."

"I saw you die!" The little boy wailed again. The child's cries only grew in intensity as if he hadn't even heard his big brother.. The ten year old started to wheeze, much like he had out in the field when his dad had started whipping him the hardest.

The thought of his dad had the little boy in near hysterics.. If he woke his dad up..

The ten year old shuddered, then began to sob even harder, making it even more difficult to breath...

The fourteen year old Dean was now thouroughly terrified.. His little brother's lips were tuning blue!

"Sammy. I need you to calm down. Please!"

"I saw you die!" The ten year old screamed "IsawyoudieIsawyoudieIsawyoudie." The ten year old chanted franticly.

"SAMMY, STOP IT!... CALM DOWN!" The fourteen year old commanded as he shook his little brother.

The ten year old drew in a wheezing breath and started to wail, long, drawn out, grieveous, mournful cries of anguish and heartbreak... They were the cries of someone who'd just watched the person they loved most in all the world die, right before their eyes.

Sammy's lips were a startling shade of blue and Sammy sounded like he was dying! The fourteen year old Dean, didn't know what to do... His dad had gotten a call about a hunt two states over and had already headed out, hours ago and with the way his dad drove, he was probably already half way there. If Sammy really was in, real, immediate, medical trouble, their dad wouldn't be back in time to..

The fourteen year old couldn't think like that!

The fourteen year old knew he couldn't call nine-one-one unless he couldn't get a handle on the quickly escalating situation.. Cause if he did end up having no choice but to call nine-one-one, then C.P.S. would come snooping around asking what two boys their age were doing all alone in an old run down abandonned house out in the middle of nowhere... And then he and Sammy would be taken to Faster Care, they'd be seperated... This could be his last moment with his little brother if he couldn't get him to calm down and breath!

The fourteen year old Dean, pressed his forehead against the forehead of his ten year old little brother.

"Sammy." The fourteen year old pleadingly whispered as he cradled his little brother's face in his hands.

His top lip was brushing against Sam's, but the fourteen year old Dean, was terrified and wasn't thinking about how closely what he was doing resembled a kiss... All he cared about was getting Sammy to breath again.

"Please, Sammy..." The fourteen year old whispered. "Breath... Calm down and breath.. Please."

"I saw you die." The ten year old gasped "Dean! I SAW YOU DIE!"

"It wasn't real Sammy please!.. Please.. It wasn't real.. I'm right here, Sammy! I'm right here! You just need to calm down and breath... Sammy please."

"I couldn't save you." The ten year old sobbed. "You died because of me.. I'm the reason you died." The little boy seemed as if he was in shock.. Like real, shock. And the fourteen year old Dean had seen his fair share of people suffering from shock, so he would know.

"I didn't die. Sammy.. It was just a bad dream. It wasn't real. I'm right here."

"I don't want you to die." The little boy sobbed.

"I'm not gonna die, Sammy."

"I don't want you to leave me."

"I'm not goin anywhere, Sammy."

"Dean?" The little boy finally, really, looked up at his big brother with his wide, terrified eyes that were filled to the brim with even more tears.

"See, Sammy.. I'm still right here, and I'm okay. It was just a nightmare." The fourteen year old whispered soothingly as he wrapped his arms around his little brother and began to rock him. "I'm not goin anywhere, Sammy." The fourteen year old stated once again, to reassure the ten year old Sammy that nothing could drag him away from his little brother's side.

The ten year old still cried, but not as intensely as he curled into his big brother's chest.

"Dean?" The ten year old's teary voice was inquisitive.

"Yeah, kiddo?"

"I hate hunting." The little boy whispered the confession as if he was afraid he'd incure his big brotherr's or even worse, his daddy's wrath.

"Me, too, Sammy." The fourteen year old's murmured reply was barely audible, but the ten year old still heard him.

"Maybe.." The ten year old whispered "Maybe, we won't have to keep doing it when we're grown ups?"

"Maybe, kiddo.. But what would we do instead?"

"We could both have houses, we could live next door to each other." The ten year old replied drowsily.

"Sounds expensive. We'd need really good paying jobs."

"What kind of jobs?"

"Well, being a doctor pays the best, but being something like a lawyer pays really good and you don't have to ever have to stitch anyone up." The fourteen year old stated jokingly, but his ten year old brother was taking everything to heart.

"So, we'll both be lawyers." The ten year old stated with conviction "And we'll both have our own houses and we won't have to hunt ever again."

"Sounds like a good plan, kiddo." The fourteen year old Dean would've said anything to make his little brother, happy in that moment. He wasn't gonna lie, though.. He too dreamed of a life where he'd never have to hunt, ever again...

The ten year old was more content and felt safer than he'd felt in a really long time. If he could just get through school and graduate, he and Dean, could get out of hunting, they could both have good lives and he'd never have to be the reason Dean died...

The ten year old yawned tiredly.. Then everything grayed out again...

Present day Dean was now shedding mournful tears of his own.. His baby brother hadn't gone off to Stanford, just for himself.. Sammy had wanted to give both of them the life that those two little boys had dreamed about so many years before...

The next morning, the ten year old was shakier than ever.. When his dad woke up.. He'd have to go back out to the field and work on hitting a target.. The ten year old didn't think he could handle another spanking like the one from the previous day..

"Hey, kiddo." His big brother's voice made the ten year old jump.

"Is dad up yet?" The ten year old hoped he was masking his fear well, he didn't want his big brother to know how much their dad scared him.. He didn't want to tell Dean, why he was scared of their dad...

"Oh.." The fourteen year old seemed caught off guard.. "Dad got a call about a hunt.. He left last night, a couple of hours before you had that nightmare... How are you feelin this mornin, by the way?"

Just thinking about it made the ten year old want to start crying again.. "It felt so real.. Like it was really happening and there was nothing I could do to stop it. To keep you from dying."

"Hey.." The fourteen year old whispered as he reached out for his little brother "Just remember.. It wasn't real... Okay?"

"Okay." The ten year old nodded as he borrowed into his big brother's chest.

"We better start on those chores." The fourteen year old groaned "It's already past ten and if we don't get started now, we won't be done by tonight and dad'll have our asses."

"Dad's coming back tonight?" The ten year old was panicking.. Why, why couldn't this be one of those hunts that kept his dad away for at least a week?

"He'll be on his way back by tonight... He'll be home in the morning and if the chores don't get done.."

"Okay." The ten year old stated, he didn't need the mental image, when the day before was still fresh in his memory. "Where do you want me to start?"

"Do the kitchen and I'll tackle the bedroom and the bathroom."

The brothers worked well together, but they were both still too young to appreciate how well they moved in tandum, as if they were on person.. The two of them working together made an effective and efficient team that had most of the chores done within three hours, there were only a handful of chores left to do and then they'd have the rest of the long summer day to do whatever they wanted..

"Hey, Sammy.. Wanna help me tackle cleaning the guns?"

The ten year old tensed up.. He didn't even wanna so much as have to look at a gun, let alone touch one.. But it was a chore and it had to be done.. And he was really thankful that his big brother hadn't saddled him with the chore to do all by himself... So the little boy gave his big brother an unenthusiastic nod and trudged over to the kitchen table, where lighting in the rickity old house was the best...

After cleaning and putting together the fourty-five that had started all of his gun related nightmares, the ten year old looked over at his big brother and gathered up his courage enough to tentitavely ask "Dean, would you teach me how to shoot?"

The ten year old held his breath.. "But dad's already teaching you how to shoot." The fourteen year old replied.

"Yeah.. But I never hit any of the targets and dad said that if I can't hit a target by Friday he's gonna.." The ten year old clampoed his mouth shut before he said too much.

"Gonna what?" The fourteen year old asked as if it couldn't possibly be that big of a deal.

"He's gonna give me ten swats.".. Well it was a partially honest answer.

The fourteen year old sputtered through a laugh "Sammy, that's bull crap.. Dad's not gonna really spank you if you can't hit a target by Friday.. He's just trying to motivate you.. He'd never really do something like that."

Present day Dean wanted to smack his fourteen year old self upside the head.

The ten year old just gaped at his older brother "Please, Dean" the little boy was ready to throw himself to the ground and literally beg at his big brother's feet.

"Okay, kiddo.. But you'll have to be the one to clean the guns we take out back with us to use. Got it?"

"Yeah." The little boy felt a huge wave of relief crash over him.. Dean would help him do better...

The fourteen year old took his brother out to the back yard, which was perfect for target practice.. And once again, present day Dean wanted to smack his fourteen year old self upside the head.. WHY, why hadn't he ever questioned why their dad took Sammy out to some other far off field when they'd had the perfect yard for target practice?.. Once again his failure to question things had caused him to fail his little brother.

The ten year old tensed as his big brother started to rearrange his stance "First off, kiddo.. How you're standing's all wrong." The fourteen year old stated as he continued to obliviously maneuvered his little brother into a better stance.

Then the fourteen year old started to work on the ten year old Sammy's grip on the gun. "Second.. You have to hold the gun steady, but not like in a death grip." he stated as he fixed his little brother's hold.

"Now, look down the sight, get a target lined up with the piece of the sight that's in the center.. Then once you do.. Look past the sight and focus on the target, but keep the center of the sight in view. Keep it lined up with your target.. Got it?"

The ten year old nodded, feeling more confident already.

"Okay.. Then when you have your target lined up.. Exhale and squeeze the trigger."

The ten year old did everything his big brother told him to. He followed the clear, step by step, instructions and remembered his stance, remembered the placement of his hands on the gun.. He could do this...

He exhaled and squeezed the trigger... The gun didn't almost bounce out of it's hands like it had every other time, ever since he'd taken his first shot... And best of all.. The can he'd had lined up with the center of the sight, was laying on the ground with a bullet hole in it...

"I did it!" The ten year old exclaimed as he jumped up and down exitedly. "IdiditIdiditIdidit! THANKS, DEAN!"

"Okay.. Easy, tiger." The fourteen year old chuckled foundly at his exited little brother "There's still other stuff to learn.. Sure you're doin okay with a handgun now.. But firing a rifle's a totally different ball game.. Then there's shotguns.. Shotguns are different because their shots scatter and they don't have as long of range as a rifle."

Now, the ten year old was dismayed once more.. Until his big brother pulled out a rifle and a shotgun and said "So, I guess I better get to work, with teaching you how to shoot these."...

The little boy had never felt so relieved... Now his dad wouldn't have a reason to spank him for missing targets ever again...

When the scene faded to black again, present day Dean had to dry his eyes.. At least he'd done one thing right, by his baby brother...


	7. Chapter 6. Part 2.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> If you notice these Chapters are "named" it's because in the original over on FF.net I had to split Chapter 6 up a bit..
> 
> ~0~
> 
> Also I fixed a few mistakes here that still exists over at FF.net on the original.. 
> 
> ~0~

..

..

The darkness transitioned into the same field from when Sam was ten once more.

Present day Dean guessed this was right after their father had gotten back from his hunt.

Present day Dean brushed the palm of his free hand down the side of his face in frustration.. What was their father gonna do to Sammy now?

"Please, dad. Please, I know you weren't always that guy, you couldn't have been. Please." Present day Dean begged.

Ten year old Sammy stared down the field and the targets and finally understood as he took in the empty beer cans and whiskey bottles..

Those bottles and cans had once been full... And there was so many... God, had his dad gotten drunk before every single shooting 'lesson'? How drunk was his dad right now?

The ten year old did everything his big brother had taught him, he got into a better stance, he fixed his hold on the gun, he lined up the center of the sight with a target, he looked down the barrel of the gun and focused only on the target and the center of the sight, he exhaled and squeezed the trigger..

"I did it. Dad, did ya see it?! Did ya see it?! I hit one!"

"Now, hit the rest of them. And don't think about telling me that you can't because you've just proven otherwise. So if you miss, ever again, the next beating I give you, there'll be fourty swats, on your bare ass. Understand?"

The ten year old swallowed a basketball sized lump in his throat as all of his enthusiasm dissipated. "Yes, Sir." He choked out with fear.

When all the targets had been either shattered or knocked from their perch on the fence, the ten year old's father looked down on him and said "Now, you need to pick up your pace, you can't just sit there lining up you're aim all day while some monster makes your brother into it's meal."

The ten year old's father lined up another assortment of bottles and cans.. And that couldn't be good, because then that meant... It meant that the ten year old's dad, was really drunk...

Once he had made his way, back up the field, the ten year old's father pulled out a stop watch "You have two minutes, to knock all of them down."

The ten year old did not want to know the consequences of failing this task. He really didn't.. But there was fifteen targets, thirteen beer cans, and two whiskey bottles.. The ten year old didn't want to think about the alcohol that had been in the containers, because if he did, he'd think about how drunk his dad possibly was.. Fifteen targets.. In two minutes.. Was that even possible?

Two minutes.. That's a hundred and twenty seconds. That's eight seconds for each target. The odds of success were not in the ten year old's favor and he knew it.

The ten year old's father gave the stern order to begin as he clicked the stop watch. The ten year old managed to hit nine targets. Nine, out of fifteen. Would he get a reprieve for at least getting more than half?

"You missed six targets." The ten year old's father stated with a disappointed shake of his head. "Do you realize, that if this had been a hunt and those targets had been monsters, either me or your brother could be dead right now, all because of your incompetence?"

"I'm sorry, daddy."

"Sorry, isn't good enough!"

"I tried my hardest.. I did." The ten year old whispered with a sob "Please don't hit me daddy."

The ten year old's father just gave him a look of disgust, but something else flickered across his features and present day Dean, recognized it.. It was guilt...

"Go to the car, we're done for the day." The ten year old's father said in a gruff tone.

Relief flooded Dean as the scene transitioned again.

Dean wiped his free hand across his mouth, he'd felt the ten year old Sammy's fear. They had both thought it was going to be so much worse than that... God, was that what Sam had felt every time he'd been alone with their dad growing up? It had taken almost thirty years for Dean to get over whatever denial he had about his dad having a drinking problem.. But Sam had figured it out and accepted it at only ten years old.. Present day Dean felt disgusted with himself...

Same kid.. Different field, present day Dean didn't know where or when he was, yet again.. But he could smell beer and whiskey and knew their dad was close to wherever Sammy was. And how could Sammy have been able to stand that smell?.. Better yet, how could his past self not catch that his dad had smelled like a walking brewery a good portion of the time?

At the other end of the field there were fifteen targets. The Sammy of then didn't want to think about what they were or what they had contained anymore and present day Dean didn't blame him.

"Two minutes." Their father's voice commanded "Starting, now."

The Sammy of then had gotten faster, whenever present day Dean was, the Sammy of then had somehow worked his way up to hitting twelve targets within two minutes.

"There's three still standing." Their father stated with an air of disgust "You've had two months to improve and you still can't complete the simplest task of taking all the targets down in the time I gave you."

"Because it's not enough time." The still ten year old mumbled.

"What, did you just say to me?"

"Because it's not enough time." The ten year old stated louder, but now his voice was fearful and sounded at the brink of tears.

The ten year old's father grabbed him by the front of the shirt and hoisted him into the air, so that they were nose to nose.. The ten year old's body was wracked by terrified tremors as he looked into his father's rage filled eyes.

"It's plenty of time!" The ten year old's father roared into his frightened child's face. The child felt bits of spittle spraying his face and he cringed as the quaking of his body, grew in intensity. "It's plenty of time and don't you dare say it's not, because it only takes a few seconds, boy.." The father growled as he shook his son "It only takes a few seconds, for a monster to get the drop on one of us, and if you can't kill it, then it will kill us!"

The father gave the ten year old another shake then dropped him, the boy stumbled as he landed and fell to his rear. Looking up as their father towered over the ten year old, was enough to flood Dean's veins with ice water.

The man could be a frightening presence when he was sober, but this, what present day Dean was seeing, was terrifying enough to haunt his nightmares for life. And his brother had faced this horrifying moment all alone, when he was only ten.

The ten year old's father hauled the boy from the ground by the back of his shirt and drug him towards the Impala.

The child's father pushed him towards the car then bent over and picked up a bottle from the duffle bag from the ground.

"Dad, please, don't drink anymore."

"Shut your mouth, boy." The child's father's tone was full of malice, then the child's father took a long drink from the bottle.

"Bend over and put your hands against the front of the car."

"Dad, please.. I.."

"Now, Sam!"

"I'm sorry, please I'm sorry." The ten year old sobbed as he did as commanded. Fighting his instinct to run when he turned his back to his enraged father as he did so.

"Not as sorry as you're gonna be."

The ten year could hear the belt sliding through the denim loops of his father's jeans "I'm sorry, daddy, please." His body trembled with fear, the child was thoroughly terrified. It seemed like he would be waiting forever for that first swat as the seconds ticked by... He knew how bad a spanking could hurt if his daddy hit him too hard.. And what if his daddy, made him take it on his bare rear like he'd threatened to do months ago?

*WHAP!*

The ten year old flinched at how sudden the swat to his thankfully still denim clad bottom had happened, then he huffed out a pained breath, it hurt. But not as bad as it could.

*WHAP!*

He could get through this.

*WHAP!*

He understood why he was being punished.

*WHAP!*

He wouldn't talk back to his daddy like that again.

*WHAP!*

The belt fell to the ground. And only after five swats. "Don't ever disrespect me like that again, Samuel."

"I won't.. Daddy.. I'm sorry. I'm really sorry." The ten year old replied through quieted sobs as his trembling body realized it wasn't going to be beaten and began to calm it's shaking.

"If you're gonna have enough backbone to say something to contradict me then you'd better learn to have the backbone to say it loud and clear, straight to my face. There better not be any more mumbling under your breath at me from now on. Understood?"

"Yes, Sir."

When the ten year old turned around his father's eyes were red and brimming with tears and the bottle of whiskey his dad had taken a drink from, had been thrown five feet from the duffle bag his dad had taken it from. It was still over half full.. The ten year old realized that his dad wasn't as drunk as he'd so wrongly assumed earlier, now he understood, that his dad hadn't ever wanted to hurt him. That his dad wouldn't hurt him so long as he was still sober enough to maintain control of his temper and actions.

The child's heart broke as he realized for the first time that his daddy was two different people, sometimes.

Sometimes his father was the daddy the ten year old knew, trusted, respected and loved and sometimes he was the monster that too much drinking brought out. That person was someone the ten year old feared and didn't trust at all. But, the little boy still loved his father unconditionally, he still even loved the part of his father that was the monster, because his daddy was always still under there somewhere, his daddy was always doing the best he could, he just needed help. But the ten year old, didn't know how to help him.

The father followed his ten year old's gaze and gave a pained and weary sigh "Get back in the car. We're done for the day."

Present day Dean could remember now.. Right as school had started the fall of ninety-three.. His dad had just suddenly stopped buying so much beer and whiskey and had also just stopped going out to bars so often, the fourteen year old Dean hadn't really noticed back then, but now that present day Dean was looking back on that time in his life, he realized, his dad had tried, had tried to get sober and stay sober, all because the ten year old Sammy had made their dad, stop and think... Too bad their dad had never been completely successful with staying sober...

The scene faded to darkness and this time, it stayed dark for a good length of time.

When Dean heard the steady thrumming of the sound, it startled him again at first with it's sudden return. Then it was just as quick to lull him to a place of comfort. Angie's tug on his hand reminded him, that there was still more to see. But Dean was feeling emotionally wrecked. He wanted, needed to stay close to the sound.

"We need to keep moving. I promise, I'll let you find out what the sound is before this is over. Okay?"

Dean nodded and turned to let Angie lead him to wherever, whenever would be next in his brother's painful memories...

The door Angie had brought him to this time was red and it had the letter "B" and the number eight.. Present day Dean remembered this place, he couldn't stop cracking "BINGO" jokes about it. This was an apartment in the "Crimson Hills" apartment complex. One of the only places they'd ever stayed in where he hadn't had to share a room with Sam...

It had been the fall of ninety-four... Meaning Sammy had been eleven.

Knowing that everything he'd seen so far had been traumatic enough to give him nightmares, present day Dean was cautious as he opened the door...

The fifteen year old him, was sprawled out on the couch thumbing through the yellow pages of a phone book.. Once again, present day Dean was seeing from Sam's perspective.

"What'ya in the mood for, Sammy, Chinese or pizza?" the fifteen year old Dean asked his little brother.

"Uggg." The eleven year old groaned in disgust "Neither.. Can't we just cook some spaghetti?"

"Don't have the stuff to make spaghetti with." The fifteen year old Dean replied.

The eleven year old trudged into the kitchen to evaluate what was available.. There was six slices of bread, a nearly empty jar of peanut butter, one can of tuna and in the refrigerator, maybe a glass' worth of milk left in the gallon.

"We need more food." The eleven year old grouched .

"I'll go get groceries tomorrow, short fry... Now pick one. Chinese or pizza?"

The eleven year old's stomach grumbled at the thought of all the grease that accompanied either, and to be completely honest, he was burnt out on both, for the time being. The child knew his big brother rather spend the money on actual food than delivery, but his big brother had only just found the twenty in the bathroom at school and there wasn't enough time to get any decent food in the fridge and cabinets before their dad got back and there had to be SOME KIND of hot food, for when their dad arrived, because a hungry dad, was a grumpy dad and a grumpy dad could evolve into someone that neither he nor his big brother wanted to deal with.

"Get whatever, I'll just make myself a couple of tuna sandwiches."

"Suit yourself." The fifteen year old stated with a shrug as he pulled the receiver from the huge box like phone on the end table up to his ear and began to punch in the numbers for whatever delivery place he had chosen.

Their father arrived just as the pizza delivery guy was leaving. Talk about cutting it close..

The eleven year old boy had been needing his dad to look over and sign his grade sheet for over a week and his dad had continually brushed him off, but the eleven year old needed it signed by the next day or else he would get detention for failing to turn it in signed to his homeroom teacher and he was just about to ask his dad if he would do it right then... Except..

The eleven year old boy noticed there seemed to be something wrong with his dad, his dad seemed rattled as he passed up the food (Not good, it was rare when his dad bypassed a chance to eat.) and headed straight for his room, closing and locking the door. But not before the eleven year old could catch the stench of alcohol that wafted off of his father... His dad was drunk, which meant something had to have happened to make his dad need to climb back into a bottle again. It was sad, that at only eleven, the child had picked up the pattern of when his father was most likely to drink and why. Of course, with learning this pattern, the eleven year old had also learned that he needed to avoid getting stuck in a situation where it was just him and his dad until his dad dried out again and he'd definitely learned when to just leave his dad alone, period, even with his big brother around...

The eleven year old made his way to his own room, which was sparsely decorated with just a periodic table pinned up next to a fold up, T.V. tray, that was being used as a makeshift desk, the only other signs that someone occupied the bedroom, besides the made bed, was the mostly empty duffle bag at the end of the bed, next to the backpack full of the eleven year old's school work and a trash bag filled with dirt laundry in the corner. It was down-right depressing.

The boy rummaged through his back pack and fished out his homework, that had to be completed by the next day as it was the last day of actual school work, before all the classes had their three Thanksgiving related days of fun before letting out for Thanksgiving break.

Thinking about Thanksgiving, the boy blushed, there was a girl from his study hall, period, who had invited him to her house for Thanksgiving, and she was like, two grades ahead of him... The eleven year old would die under pain of death, before he confessed that he had a crush on the older girl, as his big brother would never let him live it down. Plus, there was no real point in bringing it up, because he was just going to have to tell the girl 'No." anyway.

As soon as he had completed the last of his homework, the eleven year old shoved his books and papers inside his bag and stripped down to his boxers and tee-shirt, then collapsed onto the bed, sinking into sleep almost instantly.

Present day Dean waited patiently as the scene grayed out. He understood now, that if he was seeing something, it was because he needed to see it...

Once again, the eleven year old Sammy saw a flash of red, pain filled green eyes that held such fear, swam into his vision, then he saw his brother's Amulet.. Then came the growling and the bloody rips in his big brother's stomach, he could hear Dean screaming and he screamed with him.. His big brother was being torn apart, right in front of him, Dean was dying, because of him.. He was the reason Dean was dying...

"DDDDDDEEEEEEEEEEEEAAAAAAAAAANNNNN!" The eleven year old, bolted straight up with the mournful wail still ripping out of him.

"It's okay. It's just a dream. Sammy. I'm here. Right here. It's just a dream. It's not real." The eleven year old could hear his big brother's voice, but the young child, was still caught in the horrific nightmare, just like every time before. "I saw you die." The eleven year old sobbed shakily. "I saw you die... It was my fault. It's always my fault and I can't stop it. It's my fault, you die."

"What the hell's going on in here?" Their father's voice was a dangerous growl. "What's this about someone dying?"

"Sammy had a bad dream." The fifteen year old Dean reported. "He's been getting them off and on for a while now, almost always the same one."

A look crossed over their father's face as he pushed his fifteen year old away.

"What was the dream?" Their father asked.

The eleven year old, still wasn't fully awake, or aware, but he still recognized and responded to the commanding tone in his father's voice.

"Ddddeeeeeaaaaannnn!" The eleven year old wailed, "He died! I couldn't stop it!.."

"Sammy." The fifteen year old whispered as he reached out to grab his little brother's shoulder. "It was just a dream, little brother. Open your eyes. I'm right here and I'm perfectly fine."

"Dean." Their father's tone was gruff. "Go to your room."

"But, dad he needs.." It was one of the very first times the fifteen year old had openly attempted to protest his father's orders.

"Now, Dean!" Their father barked.

As soon as the fifteen year old was gone, the eleven year old's father grabbed the boy's shoulders roughly and gave a frantic shake as he asked in a panicked voice "What was in the dream?!"

"Dean, dying." The eleven year old cried, "He was getting ripped apart by an invisible monster. I couldn't stop it. It was all my fault and I couldn't stop it!"

"Where did this happen? Did you recognize anything?" Every question the child's father asked was punctuated by the father roughly shaking the eleven year old by shoulders.

Being nose to nose with his father as he was, the eleven year old could smell the sour stench of alcohol on his father's breath and it made the boy feel nauseous and being violently shaken, added with the horrors of his nightmare still lingering freshly burned into his mind, wasn't helping the child's upset stomach any.

"I don't know. I only saw Dean and blood, all I could hear was him screaming and the monster growling. And Dean was dying. Dean was dying." The eleven year old replied with a choked sob, that turned into retching as the child vomited.

The eleven year old's father backed away just in time to avoid being covered in the contents of the child's stomach. The child's father looked at him with obvious disgust, written into his hardened gaze.

"Clean up this mess then get back to bed." The eleven year old's father said with clear disdain, lacing his tone as he left the room.

The eleven year old couldn't help the sobs that still wrenched themselves from his broken heart as he cleaned up the puddle of his own vomit from the floor, then he stripped the sheets from his bed and remade it with another set of dirty ones that were still better than the ones with vomit on them. He couldn't keep the tremors from wracking his body, it had been months since his daddy had gotten so angry with him, the child understood that his father's drinking caused his daddy to get mad at him and also caused his daddy to be mean to him, he just didn't understand. WHY?.. What was it about HIM that brought the monster out in his father when his father was drunk and no one else but him and his dad was around? Why, did his daddy keep telling him that he'd be the reason Dean died?

Heartbroken and needing his big brother the eleven year old quietly tiptoed to the fifteen year old Dean's room and was about to knock on the door, when he heard his father's gruff voice from the other side of the closed door.

"I want you to have a bag packed and ready in the next five minutes, I'm taking you to Jim's and you better never think to question my orders like that ever again." Their father was snarling like a feral animal, the eleven year old wondered what orders his big brother may have dared to question.

"And what about Sammy?" The eleven year old could hear his big brother's voice asking.

"He needs to grow up and learn that hunting comes first and that we don't have time to sit and coddle him anymore. He's old enough to start lookin out for himself. Now get packed, and don't make me have to tell you again."

"Yes, Sir." The eleven year old's big brother replied, sounding shaken up.

Fearful of the consequences of being caught out of his room, while also eavesdropping no less, after his father had so angrily ordered him back to bed once the vomit was sufficiently cleaned up, the eleven year old rushed to his room, without thinking to close the door behind him, and threw himself into the bed and pulled the only blanket, to escape the vomiting fiasco unscathed, up over him in one fluid motion that would have Houdini in awe. The eleven year old calmed his breathing and feigned sleep as he heard his father's heavy footfalls, growing closer to the end of the hall.

"Why's this door open?" The eleven year old's father growled.

Eleven years old or not, Sammy was a smart kid and was good at thinking quickly, despite what his dad thought about him "The room smells bad.."

"Well, don't let the stink into the hall, you're gonna make the rest of us sick with that smell, stop being so lazy and be smart for a change and open a window." The eleven year old's father grouched.

"But, daddy, what about the salt lines?" The eleven year old asked with as much sleepy 'little kid' innocence as he could muster, knowing that if he sounded confused and sleepy, he'd get a pass for the insubordination of making his father look like a fool, especially with his big brother right down the hall. But in all honesty, the child sort of wanted to show his father up for a change. He was quickly becoming fed up with continuously taking his dad's crap.

Well that had firmly put the eleven year old's father in his place. The child's father's scowl faded as he took a step back from the door way, as if for a moment, he had the good sense to feel ashamed of his earlier behavior, then the eleven year old's father spoke, the stern tone, not having the edge that it normally carried as he did so "Pastor Jim called me for a hunt and I'm taking Dean up to Minnesota with me, so you're gonna be alone for the next three days."

"Why does Dean have to go with you?" The eleven year old asked, knowing he was pushing boundaries, but he knew his daddy was slightly more sober than earlier and that his big brother was right down the hall, which added to his bravery.

"Because I said so!" The eleven year old's father bellowed.

"But what about school?" Now the eleven year old was concerned for his big brother, Dean was a Sophomore in high school, which meant there'd be class work all the way up till that coming Friday, possibly even take home work to do over Thanksgiving break. If his big brother missed three whole days of school work, he could fall behind in his classes, which could make him lose points from his G.P.A., which was a big deal, because despite what most people assumed about Dean's intelligence and ability to do satisfactory school work, the eleven year old knew for a fact that his big brother was actually secretly, prideful of being a straight "A plus" student with a stellar four point O grade point average.

"Dean'll be old enough to quit when he's sixteen without us having to worry about C.P.S. getting involved. Dean missing a few days of school this week's not gonna matter any, come nine weeks from now."

"You can't make Dean quit school." All pretense of being a sleepy and confused, innocent 'little kid' had dissolved into white hot rage as the eleven year old climbed out of his bed, this was not something the eleven year old would lay down for, both literally and figuratively.

"Dean understands the sacrifices that need to be made to save the lives of others."

"But what about?.."

"The decision's been made, Sam." His father's voice held a dark warning. "This trip's gonna be about teaching him how to cut the apron strings, I can't have him distracted by thinking about you. Cause that'll get him killed.."

"You taking him up against monsters is what's gonna get him killed!" The eleven year old snarled.

Just as the eleven year old's father was going to deal out firey retribution, the fifteen year old Dean called from just outside the doorway "I'm packed and ready to go."

"Then let's go." The eleven year old's father shot the boy a glare "You already know the drill, Sam. I expect you to keep all the chores around here done, make sure all the doors and windows have salt lines and no inviting anyone over or letting anyone in. Don't go thinking this time alone's gonna give you free reign to mess up or slack off."

The eleven year old's father didn't even wait for a response as he turned and stalked to his room, grabbed his packed duffle and stormed towards the front door, their father opened the door and said "Let's go, Dean." he wasn't even giving the brothers a moment to say goodbye. As the fifteen year old got out into the Impala the eleven year old's father turned and sounded void of all emotion as he said "Remember that the next three days without your brother is an example of what your life'll be like, if Dean dies because of you, cause I damn sure won't stick around.."

The eleven year old had no idea what his father had meant by that. He wasn't the one dragging Dean off to go chasing after monsters that could rip him to pieces. But there was a sensation at the back of the child's mind, it vaguely told the boy, that his nightmare was more than just a normal nightmare and that his father had taken his big brother and fled, so that the family freak couldn't get him killed. The eleven year old's father had taken his big brother and had gotten as far from him as possible to keep his big brother safe. Safe from him and whatever his nightmare might mean.

Looking at the clock the eleven year old saw that it was midnight, on the dot, a chill went up the boy's spine as an ominous feeling swept over him, a subtle white noise that ate away at his conscience with corrosive fear, guilt and fresh grief, telling him that it would be his fault, it was always going to be his fault and there was nothing he could do to stop. The time meant something, the nightmare meant something, the overwhelming feeling, he had in the pit of his stomach meant something, it all meant something... But what?.. What did it mean?...

The eleven year old, tossed and turned, his breath hitching as he tried to repress his sobs, his daddy and his big brother were in danger, because he was some kind of freak that would be the reason they both died.. No wonder his daddy had taken his big brother and ran.. The child let out a mournful cry, he didn't know, when or if he'd ever get to see Dean again.. Would his dad take the risk of continuing to let them live under the same roof together, when he was a danger to his big brother, to what was left of his small family?.. What if his dad didn't bring Dean back with him, when he returned?.. What if his dad, decided not to come back at all?

Eventually, exhaustion claimed the, still crying, eleven year old's consciousness.

As the scene grayed out once more, present day Dean buckled and only Angie holding his hand, kept him from falling face first into the void. "He was seeing.. Oh god no, he was just a kid and he was seeing... His first visions were of me.. Of how Lillith's hellhound tore me apart and drug my soul to Hell. And our dad, he... That bastard, he let Sammy think.. And me.. I couldn't even put two and two together when Sammy started realizing that his nightmares were more than just bad dreams.. Oh god, I messed up. I messed up so bad. Sam, Sammy please. Please forgive me little brother. I didn't know. I didn't see. Didn't understand. But I get it now, Sammy. I get it, baby brother. Oh god, please forgive me, Sammy, please, forgive me."

"Dean." Angie's tone was filled with graceful, benevolence in her attempt to sooth the distraught mortal.

"I made him live through his worst nightmare!" Dean sobbed "It was my choice and I made the deal, I put him through that and I did it without even realizing just how bad.. No wonder he went off the rails when.. Oh god.. Sammy.. I'm so sorry.."

When colors and sounds began to filter through once more, present day Dean wanted to buckle, he couldn't take witnessing anymore of his brother's heartbreak.. How had his little brother gotten through all of those horrible things?.. How had his little brother come out the other side of everything and still manage to stay the big hearted, ever forgiving, unconditional loving, kind and caring, giant, Sammy, that he'd always known and loved?.. Yeah, there were times, that his kid brother had, had issues reigning in his temper, but now that he was seeing the things he was seeing, Dean couldn't blame the kid for having a few temperamental outbursts, in fact, he was surprised that his little brother hadn't lashed out more or with more violence than he had.. And, yeah, Sammy had made mistakes, but after seeing what he was seeing, Dean now understood that his kid brother had been, pushed into those mistakes by circumstances, that would have had Dean destroying the world and everyone in it, if those things had happened to him... Yet, through it all, Sam was still somehow, SAM, the big friendly giant of a man who wore his heart on his sleeve and wanted nothing more than to be good and to do good...

The first thing the eleven year old was aware of, was how quite it was in the apartment. Usually it sounded like a stampede was trampling from bathroom, to kitchen, to Dean's room then back down the hall with grouchy mumbles of a voice saying they could have sworn they'd left their shoes by the couch and "Sammy, don't gripe at me if we're late, you're the one who actually likes school, so get your but out of bed and stop bitching that it's too early, or I'll leave your butt behind, IF I can ever find my shoes.. Sammy have you seen my shoes?".. But this morning it was quiet, too quiet, because his big brother wasn't there.. Dean wasn't there.. Wasn't there to stampeded through the apartment in his rush to get them both ready and to school, before the school cafeteria stopped serving breakfast, which was the real reason, Dean would be getting them both out the door so early each morning, cause sometimes that was the only way to guarantee they'd both get at least two meals on the weekdays.. But his big brother would never admit that, would never admit that there were days when he didn't know just how he was gonna keep them both fed, would never admit that sometimes he went to bed crying because they were down to next to nothing, food-wise, in their kitchen, and had no money for more food.. Would never admit that he was scared, because sometimes he didn't know what to do.. But the eleven year old knew anyway, knew they had trouble with money.. Just another way he was ruining the lives of everyone in his small family.. For the first time the eleven year old began to think of how his dad and big brother would be better off without him...

The eleven year old almost decided to just skip school, because what was the point of going, when his dad was just gonna make him quit when he turned sixteen anyway?.. But the boy was ever dutiful, not to his dad, but to his big brother and he had nine weeks to figure out how to help keep Dean in school.. So the eleven year old dressed in his 'cleanest' dirty clothes as there had been no money for doing laundry for some time, and made the five mile walk to the school by himself...

The eleven year old's day didn't go much better than his night as kids made fun of how he smelled like barf, the boy was just now realizing what a mistake it was to have put those sheets in the bag with the rest of the laundry, but other than a few verbal jabs and a few times of getting shoved, jostled and elbowed, the child managed to escape the bullying, mostly unscathed. Then there was his homeroom teacher.. The eleven year old, felt his stomach knot up as he tried to explain, why, he had yet to turn in his signed grade sheet. The eleven year old's, normally, tolerant and patient teacher had told the child what would happen if he failed to turn in the signed grade sheet, as it had been a week and she was not going to accept any more excuses from the eleven year old. So the child spent his lunch hour in detention with his lunch tray, at his desk, in his homeroom class, while he wrote sentences that said "I will bring my signed grade sheet to school on time." a hundred times..

When the final bell of the school day, finally rung, the eleven year old made the walk over to the high school and caught his big brother's homeroom teacher, just as she was leaving..

"Excuse me, ma'am.. I'm Sam Winchester.. Dean Winchester's little brother."

"Oh, it's so nice to meet you, is everything okay? I missed your brother in class today." The tenth grade teacher asked with a concerned smile.

"Um.. Dean's gonna be out sick, for at least the rest of the week and I was hoping to get his homework for him so he doesn't fall behind."

"Well, that's very sweet of you." The teacher beamed at the eleven year old, like he was just the 'cutest thing' as she rummaged through her desk and found the day's assignments, then handed them to the boy. "You're going to have to go around to his other classes and get his other homework, but only for today.. Tomorrow, I'll gather all of his work so that all you'll have to do is pick it up from here and won't have to go running around the school, to chase down his teachers. I hope Dean gets better soon." The teacher stated sweetly.

"Me, too.. Thank you, ma'am." The eleven year old replied as he stuffed his big brother's homework in with his own and turned to go to each of his big brother's classes to collect all of Dean's homework..

Thirty minutes later the eleven year old left the high school, feeling successful in his mission to give his big brother a better chance at getting to stay in school for longer than just nine more weeks...

The child had a bit harder time walking home than usual, his big brother's books, were much heavier than his own, so it took a little longer than normal to walk the five miles from the school to his apartment. As soon as he was home, the eleven year old pulled out his older brother's homework... There was a tug of guilt on his conscious.. He was technically about to cheat.. Okay.. He was, ACTUALLY, going to cheat, there was no other way to put it, that wouldn't be a lie.. But his big brother's homework, had to be done by the next day, and Dean wasn't there to do it, so.. It was up to the eleven year old to get it done.

How much harder than fifth grade homework, could tenth grade homework be?

The eleven year old poured over his big brother's text books, trying to figure out, how the heck a person could get an answer out of the math problems that were made up of the strangest mix of letters, numbers and symbols, that he'd ever seen. The eleven year old eyed the phone warily. He knew he couldn't call his big brother and ask, that would just give what he was doing away and it might make their dad angry, if he caught wind of it. So, the eleven year old dialed the number of the only other person, he could think of, that was smart enough, to figure out how to do his big brother's math homework.

After three rings, the other end of the line was answered with a gruff "Singer's Auto Salvage, and tow service.."

"Uncle Bobby?" The eleven year old cut the old man off, to let him know that this wasn't a 'normal', normal, business call, heck itt wasn't even that kind of NORMAL, business call.

"Sam? What in blue blazes are ya callin this number for? Is everything okay?" The old man sounded concerned, but he was trying to hide his worried tone. Too bad the eleven year old had a sharp intuition that picked up on it anyway.

"Yeah.. Yeah, it's nothing like that, Uncle Bobby, I just need some help with, uh.. With some math homework."

The eleven year old, tried to pretend that he didn't hear the old hunter's sigh of relief. Now the child felt really guilty, as he pictured poor Bobby, clutching his chest from a near heart attack, that would have been all his fault since he had probably just scared the man half to death for a second there.

"Why can't Dean or your daddy help you with it?"

"They're not here, right now and it has to be done by tomorrow."

If the old hunter could tell that Sam was trying not to trip around the purposeful omission of details, he never said anything. The older man gave a world weary sigh and asked "What kind of math homework are you havin trouble with, kid?"

"Advanced Calculus." The eleven year old ventured timidly.

"Balls." The old man muttered. "Give me a second, boy, I have just the thing layin around that might help us both out with this one."

There was the sound of rummaging around in the background, then it sounded like something, most likely a stack of books, went crashing to the ground, then there was a few muttered curses from the old hunter, before, finally, Bobby's voice came back over the line saying "Okay, so what exactly do the math problems look like?"

"Uh.." the eleven year old gulped "There's a lower case, letter 'd' over a line and they're both over the lowercase letters 'dx', then there's a weird symbol that looks like a capital 'J' but it's really long at the top, doesn't have a line at the top, like a normal capital 'J' and the swing's not as big as it should be.."

"Kid, kid, ya need to slow down!.."

"But the 'J' doesn't look right and I have no idea how to describe the small little symbol above it that looks like two cursive capital "L's" one's upside down and flipped backwards and stacked on top of the normal looking.."

"Sam!" The old hunter snapped gruffly "For, Pete's sake, boy, give me a chance to catch up! Would'ya?"

"Sorry, Uncle Bobby." The eleven year old replied, sounding thoroughly chastised.

"It's alright, kid, just, give an old man a chance, here. It's not like I've got a degree in mathematics. Ya know?" The gruff hunter had a bit more gentleness to his tone as he said "Why exactly has your teachers got you doin math like that for anyway? Surely they didn't just drop work like this on ya without at least first teaching you how to work the problems... Oh.. Hell! Boy, why are you trying to do your brother's homework?!"

Now that the eleven year old had been caught in his attempt at deception, he had no choice, but to tell the truth. "Dean's with dad on a hunt for the next three days and it was either tell the school he's sick and get his homework for him and have it done and turned in each day as if he was here, or Dean's grades could start slipping. He could fall really far behind, Uncle Bobby."

"Well, then it's your daddy's job to make sure to get Dean's absences excused, then Dean can make up all the homework he's missed. As good as your intentions are, Sam, it's still cheating and Dean wouldn't want you to ever resort to those sorts of measures."

"But Uncle, Bobby..."

"No, buts, Sam. Your daddy's the one that has to be responsible for getting Dean's absences excused and Dean has to be the one responsible for making up his work."

"Uncle Bobby, PLEASE LISTEN!" The eleven year old shrieked in desperation.

"What, Sam? What's wrong?"

"Dad doesn't think it matters. Uncle Bobby, I think he's gonna make Dean quit school in nine weeks, after he turns sixteen."

Present day Dean could hear how earnest and sincere the eleven year old Sammy was in his desire to help his big brother stay in school. His heart broke a bit more for the kid and he wanted to tell the eleven year old Sammy, not to bother, cause even if the then fifteen year old Dean somehow managed to stay in school for another year, he would definitely be dropping out only a month after his eighteenth birthday. There just was never gonna be any saving the eleven year old Sammy's, big brother's academic career, because things would eventually happen to make this Sam's Dean start losing all interest in even going to school, that Dean's grades were going to start slipping and with their dad moving them around so much it was only a matter of time before any school that Past Dean went to started considering him as a lost cause that wasn't worth their time.

"Son of a.." The old hunter's gruff voice trailed off, but when it came back it was laced with a mix of what present day Dean recognized as sadness, pride, anger and guilt.. Of course, there was only one person who could hear Sammy plead like that and not have their heart melt and that person was not Bobby Singer. As gruff as he might've been, the man was a sucker for kids. Especially great kids like Sammy "Okay, son, finish telling me what the problems look like.."

"You're gonna help me?" The eleven year old's voice was watery, but hopeful.

"This is the ONE and ONLY time I'm gonna condone you doing cheating of any kind. Do you understand me, kid?"

"Yes, Sir, Uncle Bobby."

"Good, cause if I ever get wind that you cheat at something ever again after your brother gets back and I'll turn you over my knee, myself. Do you hear me, Samuel Winchester?"

"Yes, Uncle Bobby, I swear I.."

"Don't swear, kid. Just don't try cheating on anything ever again. Now, tell me what the rest of that blasted math looks like. But go slow, cause the only times I'm used to seeing letters mix with math, there's usually either weapons or car parts involved, but none of it's ever looked like what you're describing."

"'Kay Uncle Bobby." The eleven year old replied with a grateful sniffle, then he proceeded to describe each of the math problems to Bobby, one by one.

After three hours of back and forth questions and explanations, the eleven year old, finally understood how to work at least half of the problems, and two hours later the boy was well on his way to being able to work them all. Whatever book his Uncle Bobby had found had given really detailed explanations of what, both, major branches of Calculus were, what they were used for, what connected them and most importantly, how to go about working the problems through to a solution.

By the end of the night the eleven year old boy had a profound understanding of the level of intelligence his big brother had to have to get straight "A's" in his math class. He'd always known Dean was really smart. He just hoped that he could bring his brother at least a "B minus" that way his big brother wouldn't have to fight too hard to bring his grade back up. Still, even if his work got Dean an "F" it would be better that the work was done and turned in, rather than missed completely as then his big brother would still have a grade on his paper and not a big fat "ZERO" for not only missing the day, but not turning in any work as well, which would cause double marks against Dean in each class for every day that Dean was absent, which could by default cause Dean to flunk simply by the unexcused absence alone (because Sam knew damn well that their dad wouldn't care to write a note to any of Dean's teachers to try to get the absences excused, not when they'd most likely be leaving right after Christmas break started).

That night, the child went to bed with hunger pains, gnawing on his stomach as a search through the cabinets and refrigerator reminded him of the lack of food as apparently his dad or big brother had finished off the last of the milk and had eaten or had taken, any pizza that had been left over from the day before. All that was left as far as food went was two slices of bread and the near empty jar of peanut butter and the boy knew that he had to save it for as long as possible as there was still two days to go before his father returned, if he returned at all and there was no money tucked away in any of the usual hiding spots, meaning all the cash had been taken with his dad and big brother, but that was okay. They were more important than him...

The scene grayed out again and present day Dean felt dumbfounded. His eleven year old little brother had ONE: Taken it upon himself, to do work, well beyond his level of learning all in order to try to keep his fifteen year old self from losing too many points from his G.P.A. and TWO: Had been left, for, whoever knew how long, in a place with nothing but two slices of bread and a near empty jar of peanut butter for food.

Present day Dean cursed his father once again.

There was a flash of red, a scream of terrified agony, pain-filled green eyes that held pure fear. He could see Dean's Amulet, could hear his big brother's screams. He could hear the growl of the monster that was ripping his big brother to shreds. He was watching his big brother die, and he couldn't stop it. It was all his fault. Dean was dying. He was the reason Dean was dying...

"DDDEEEAAANNN!" The eleven year old bolted up with a sob. "Dd..eeaa..Nnn." The child's voice stuttered with hitching panicked breaths and gut wrenchingly, mornful sobs. "DDee.." The eleven year old's breath caught in a painful hiccough that made the boy begin to wretch, the eleven year old, barely made it to the bathroom, where he crumpled to the floor and started vomiting up the meager contents of his contents of his stomach into the toilet. When nothing was left in his stomach the boy still convulsed with horribly painful dry heaves.. Finally. The child was able to slump against the wall in between the toilet and the tub, where he stayed the rest of the night, caught between fitful bouts of nightmare filled sleep and throwing up bile and stomach acid when his nightmares sent him lunging for the toilet bowl again.

When the scene regained full color and sound again, present day Dean could feel the eleven year old Sammy's sadness. The poor child was slowly spiraling into a deep depression that cut so deep it had present day Dean clutching at his head in attempt to claw through his skull. How had his, still so young, far too young, little brother survived such loneliness, sadness and gut wrenchingly, aching despair? It felt like his own brain was turning into cement with how heavy the weight of everything the eleven year old Sam was taking onto his small shoulders.

The eleven year old gave a distraught whimper at how quiet it was in the apartment, the boy was still feeling the immense loss he'd suffered in the nightmare, no matter how much he did to reassure and remind himself that it wasn't real. That his big brother was okay. Was safe. Was with their dad. The child still couldn't get past the grief and the fact that he couldn't turn to his big brother for comfort, helped to make his nightmare feel even more real. Which made his grief, feel, more intense. The boy had spent his first full night all alone and his dad or big brother hadn't even called to let him know they'd made it to Pastor Jim's alright. Anguish and fear started to gnaw on the child's mind and caused an aching knot of feeling lost to form in the pit of his stomach. Actually, lost, wasn't the only feeling that was causing the knot, but the child didn't want to acknowledge the other feeling, the feeling that he'd truly, just been abandoned. Or worse, that something had happened to his family and they couldn't call him because the invisible monster from his nightmares had gotten both his big brother and his dad.

That thought had the child down on his knees in front of the toilet bowl again as he sobbed so hard that he wretched and wretched, until the covulsions from crying so hard and dry heaving so violently had him so wrung out that he collapsed into a shuddering heap in front of the toilet.

For a few moments the boy laid in the floor, curled into the fetal position as he clutched his tender abdomen, he was so exhausted that he couldn't even think about moving, even as convulsive heaves and sobs continued to randomly jolt through his body. Then the alarm went off, telling him, that he had no choice. He struggled to a stand knowing that he had to be stronger than this, somehow. Or else he'd be a liability to his family for quite possibly the rest of THEIR lives, as his family couldn't afford to be held back or distracted by his weakness because it could, WOULD, get them killed.

When the child looked into the mirror to begin rinsing out the sour taste of stomach acid out of his mouth, present day Dean flinched at how puffy and red his little brother's eyes were, from the shear sadness weighing inside his little brother's heart and how there were dark circles beginning to form from the lack of a decent night's rest.

The boy rummaged through his bag to make sure that he had dutifully collected all of his big brother's homework, when he came across his grade sheet. And it was signed. Tears sprang to the eleven year old's eyes as he gazed at the signature, because, while it was signed "John Winchester" it was not signed by his father's hand, this was the way his big brother signed their dad's name. The eleven year old wiped the tears from his eyes and gave a watery sigh as he grinned. It looked like he wasn't the only one who would cheat at something for his brother.

The eleven year old ran his thumb over the signature in reverence and was loathed to have to turn it in to his teacher. It could be the last thing he had to remind him of Dean that he could actually keep packed with his own belongings as it wouldn't take up much room and he didn't want to give it away, because everything else would most definitely be misered away by his dad if anything ever happened to his big brother. Just like all of anything to remind him of his mom had been, way back, when he was still too young to protest.. Back when he was still too young to say that he should get to have a chance to know about her too, that she was HIS too, just as much, as she was his dad's and big brother's and she was probably more HIS and DEAN'S, than she was their dad's, because she was THEIR.. MOM.

As the eleven year old started the five mile walk to school, the wind chill factor, decided to make itself known as it nipped at the boy's skin through his well-worn shoes, his thinning jeans and his multiple flannel shirts. When he finally arrived at school, his hands were numb, his throat was scratchy and the tips of his ears and nose really hurt.

The child's sore throat proved to be a hindrance at breakfast and a full blown pain in the rear at lunch. And the fact that kids were a bit more cruel with how they teased him, calling him "Barf Boy." and roughly shoving him or jostling him in the halls or in line as his clothes still smelled like vomit, did nothing but make the boy feel increasingly worse.

The second the final bell of the day rang, the eleven year old headed for his big brother's homeroom class once again. As promised, the eleven year old found that his big brother's teacher had indeed gotten together all of Dean's homework when he reached the highscool.

Instead of heading straight for home, the eleven year old made a three mile walk to the town's small library. That way, if he had any problems with his big brother's homework, he could just ask the librarian for help, rather than call his Uncle Bobby again.

The boy stayed in the library working on his big brother's library for four hours, when he had no choice but to leave because the library was closing.. And.. Crap... The sun was already setting.. Stupid End of Daylight Saving Time. He didn't even really know when it had started getting dark this early, because he had never really had to pay attention to that sort of thing, his big brother had always been around to make sure he was safe at home before the sun set…

He had never had to walk, anywhere, in the dark, alone. In fact up until the previous day, he had never had to walk more than a mile and a half alone. And now, he had no choice but to do both. It was a lot colder at night than it was in the day and the wind, was less forgiving as it bit through his thin denim and flannel and into his sensitive flesh at the tips of his nose and the insides of his ears.

The eleven year old was terrified as he crept through the streets and tried to avoid the bigger, meaner looking boys who all wore the same colors and called themselves the 'Bloods' but his big brother just called them 'gang banger wannabes' cause the REAL "Bloods" were in places like New York City and Los Angeles and according to Dean all the boys who roamed these streets wearing red were just copy cats who thought making people scared of them, was cool.

Knowing they were just 'wannabes' didn't do much to reassure him though when one shoved him against a wall, right down the road from his apartment, pulled a switchblade and demanded to know what a 'little snot nosed punk' like him was doing in THEIR 'hood'.

"I live in those apartments." The eleven year old murmured as he pointed towards the apartment complex, sounding suspiciously, like he might start crying. He was just eleven and he wasn't feeling one hundred percent after having such a rough two days, after all.

"Don't let us catch you 'round our turf again, punk, or next time, we'll be sending you home to your mommy in pieces." The larger, meaner boy, snarled as he shoved the eleven year old roughly into the street.

The eleven year old didn't even think as he started running, he just knew that he couldn't stop until he was home.

When he slammed and locked the door behind him. The eleven year old slumped into the floor as his heart hammered against his chest. Now he felt humiliated. Those punks were just people! He felt so weak and useless.

He was completed mortified, people, BOYS, not much older than him, had sent him running for home!

And not just running.. The eleven year old ran the bottom joints of his thumbs across his eyes, to wipe away the evidence of his weakness, the bastards had made him run home, crying.

God he was such a joke! No wonder his dad had packed up his big brother and bolted while he could!

The eleven year old forced himself to stand, despite the fact that his legs were shaking and his knees felt like Jello. That had been the first time he had dealt with bullies without the reassurance that Dean would come rescue him and he had managed to wuss out and run home, crying like a baby, instead of fighting back like he had been taught. It wasn't going to happen again. He couldn't let it. Next time someone picked on him, he was going to stand up for himself.

The eleven year old laid the salt line down at the door like he knew that he was supposed to, then he trudged to his room where he laid his backpack on the floor at the foot of his bed. Nothing else but sleep and self-castigation was on the child's overly tired mind as he crashed down on his bed and promptly passed out.

The scene grayed out again and present day Dean was fit to be tied. Someone had threatened his eleven year old little brother with a knife! And it wasn't just any someone, that 'kid' had been at least nineteen and had, had his seven 'gang banger wannabe' pals, who were all around the same age, to back him up. No wonder his kid brother had been terrified! But his poor eleven year old kid brother had just jumped right to ripping himself a new one for being weak the second he had gotten home! Man, he'd forgotten how Sammy had always been so much like their dad, but now he was seeing that likeness in a different light. Because, now he was seeing how Sam was tearing himself apart over something that he saw as his own failures and weaknesses, like how their dad had ripped Sam apart for what their dad had thought were Sam's failures and weaknesses. And that, just wasn't acceptable.

All that time Sam had been having nightmares of HIM, getting ripped apart by an invisible monster and Sam had been getting ripped apart by a very visible one, but Dean hadn't seen, he hadn't known. All that time, and he hadn't had a clue of what had been happening right under his nose.

There was a flash of red..

"We'll be sending you home to your mommy in pieces."

The eleven year old looked at the switchblade and felt fear, tear through him. There was a voice that whispered "You can fight them. Go on, it's easy. You can even kill them if you want to."

The eleven year old gulped and whimpered 'No.' as he looked up into yellow eyes.

"Aww.. Sammy. Come on and be a good little soldier for me." The sinister voice whispered, then the voice started cackling as the eleven year old was watching as one by one, the teenage hoodlums that had ganged up on him were getting, every single one of their bones snapped, by an invisible force. The hoodlums were screaming and pleading as their blood began to bubble through their unmarked skin. "It would be so easy, Sammy, you wouldn't even have to lift a finger."

"No." The eleven year old sobbed as the nightmare twisted. He could see the Amulet. Dean's green eyes filled with pain and fear. He could hear Dean's agonized and terrified screams as blood blossomed over Dean's abdomen.

"You're gonna be the reason Dean dies." The sinister voice, now sounded suspiciously like his dad.

"NO!" The eleven year old bolted upright, screaming as he heard the growls of the invisible monster and his big brother screaming out his last breaths.

"D..D..Deeeaa..Nnn!" The child wailed mournfully. He was so distraught that his sobbing caused convulsions so strong, that his ribs sucked tight into his body on the intake of each heaving breath, that took far too long to exhale, each time.

Instinctively, Present day Dean, tried to reach through whatever veil, to comfort his kid brother. Watching the eleven year old Sammy hyperventilate was utterly devastating and terrifying, he could only imagine how the poor kid had felt back then. All alone, with no one to comfort him. But Angie held fast to his hand and wouldn't allow him to attempt to aid his eleven year old, kid brother. That damned Yellow Eyed bastard had started tormenting his kid brother when he was still just a little kid! Dean anted to rip the bastard apart limb from limb!

"This has already happened Dean, it's only a memory." Angie reminded him apologetically, as spots danced in the eleven year old Sam's field of vision, before everything went black...

"What just?.." Present day Dean gasped as he tried to choke back a sob "What just happened?", the tears running down his face, were evidence, that he was not successful at holding the emotion deluge at bay. It was dark, but not like THE darkness that Angie had been guiding him through on their journey from memory, to memory.

"He just passed out from hyperventilating." Angie replied sounding on the verge of breaking down herself.

"I don't think I can.." Present day Dean felt so guilty. Because, already, he felt like he could take no more, and he was simply a spectator in something, his little brother had already lived through and he hadn't even reached the memories of Sam's early adulthood yet, where he knew, the more horrible memories of watching Jessica die and all the guilt that had caused Sam, would be prominent and some of the hardest things to watch, because of how it would remind Dean of how their mother had died.

"Yes. You can." Angie stated in a stern tone. The 'You have to, if you truly want to help Sam.' was left unsaid, but Dean still heard it loud and clear. He had to get through this. For Sam.

Present day Dean steeled himself as colors and sounds began to ebb back into the scene as the eleven year old Sam started to regain consciousness.

The boy felt lightheaded and disoriented as he sat up. The eleven year old, had no idea, what had just happened to him or how long it had lasted. All, he could remember was having the same nightmare of watching his big brother getting ripped to shreds by an invisible monster and nothing more. He felt terrified and weak for feeling terrified and just, weak in general. Lack of proper sleep and the symptoms of an oncoming cold were adding to the misery of his nightmare filled nights and his bully filled days and lack of proper nourishment to fuel his rapidly growing and changing body was combining with that misery, to weaken him even further, both in body and in mind.

"He doesn't remember The Yellow Eyed Demon or what sorts of images that bastard put inside his head?" Dean whispered "I don't understand.. How am I seeing?.."

"Even repressed memories are still memories Dean." Angie replied. "And even though, Sam doesn't know that's buried somewhere in his memory, I knew it was something that you needed to see."

"So, that's it?" Dean asked "We move on now. Right?"

"Wrong." Angie stated "There's still more for you to see before we move on completely."

Present day Dean watched as the eleven year old Sammy, looked into the mirror once again. The child's eyes were glazed, most of his skin was pale, aside from the flushed cheeks and bright red tips of the eleven year old's nose and ears and the dark shadows covering the baggy skin under his eyes.

Present day Dean recognized all of the tell, tale signs of a sick, kid brother. But there was no one there to give the child any Acetaminophen or Ibuprofen to bring the eleven year old's obvious fever down. Of course, there wasn't any of those medications for the eleven year old to take for himself either. Dean watched as the eleven year old closed the medicine cabinet with an upset sigh. Present day Dean was grateful for that small miracle, as that stuff is easy for even an adult to overdose on when they're only slightly sick. An eleven year old that can barely see straight due to fever and pain would have no chance at figuring out how much was okay to take of either medicine, especially when that eleven year old had never had to rely on himself to get his own medicines in the first place.

Dean felt guilty as he watched through the eleven year old Sammy's point of view as the boy once again made sure all of his big brother's homework was finished and loaded into his bagpack and then proceeded to get dressed for the day in another thin pair of jeans that were two inches too short at the child's ankles, and another three, rank, vomit scented, flannel shirts. It was the 'cleanest' dirty 'warm' clothes the boy had, that he had not yet re-worn, that week anyway.

Here, his eleven year old, kid brother was, SICK of all things and yet he was still going to make the five mile walk to school to try to help save his fifteen year old self's academic career? And not only was the kid sick, but he was exhausted from three nights in a row of restless, nightmare filled sleep and terror and grief induced unconsciousness. Not to mention all of the vomiting and the number that had to have been doing on the boy's already underfed body.

When the eleven year old made it to school, he was half frozen, and feeling even sicker than when he'd left home. His throat was on fire, the inside of his ears ached in the most horrible, stabbing, way, giving him a headache to boot and his stomach felt even more horrendously bruised and tender from all of the vomiting and convulsive crying. So when a group of three boys in his grade, purposefully, jostled the child in the hall as he was on his way to a much needed breakfast.. Well, who could blame the kid for snapping at them?

The other boys gathered around him and herded him towards a wall taunting him with jeers of "Oooh, Barf Boy, thinks he's a tough guy all the sudden!" and "Come on smelly! Show us how tough you are!"

"Hey! You boys knock it off over there before I give all of you morning detention!" The eleven year old had never thought he'd be so thankful to feel like a teacher was yelling at him.

The group of boys dispersed, leaving the eleven year old still pressed against the wall of his own volition, as he felt a bit paralyzed, locked in his own body, to keep his temper in check, he could have really hurt those other three boys, but instead, he hadn't been able to lift his hands to strike anyone, and wouldn't have been able to, even in self-defense if one of the boys had hit him first as he was terrified of his own anger and what he might possibly be capable of if he lost control. His dad was training him to be a killer, after all. Sure. A killer of MONSTERS. But still a killer, just the same and the boy wasn't sure if he'd be able to make the distinction between human and monster, in a situation where he had to fight, outside of training, especially if BULLIES, were the non-monsters, he would have to fight against.

Then the bell rang, and forced the eleven year old into motion, it looked like he wouldn't be getting that much needed breakfast after all.

The child's day grew even more miserable as the children in his first hour class kept whispering and snickering about HIM every time they thought the teacher wasn't paying attention. And the eleven year old, really hated to be made fun of.

In fact. MOST of the eleven year old's day was just as bad, with kids in most of his classes making fun of him or kids in the hallway shoving him or purposefully bumping into him as he made his way from class to class. BUT.. There was one ray of light in the eleven year old's dismal day. Study Hall.

Macy Williams was a pretty seventh grade girl who came into the fifth grade Study Hall during fourth period, to help mentor the fifth grade students who were academically gifted like her. And she was nice. One of the only kids that was ever actually nice, to HIM, of all people. That's why the eleven year old, had the biggest puppy love crush on her. He would blush bright red at just the thought of holding her hand. So, of course any time she so much as looked at him, the eleven year old would get flustered and when she actually TALKED TO HIM.. Wow.. The kid would get breathless, pretty darn quick.

It was a wonder he didn't pass out on her when she came up to him in Study Hall, sat down, slipped a piece of paper across the table to him and said "It's my home address. I really would like it if you reconsidered coming over for Thanksgiving."

"I don't think I'll be able to. My dad hardly ever lets me do anything.."

"Sam?" Macy looked disappointed, but also concerned as she interrupted him "We're having our dinner at four in the afternoon. That's still early enough in the day to celebrate with your family. Maybe if you tell your dad that. He'll let you come."

"I really don't think so." The eleven year old replied.

"Well, that kinda sucks. I was hoping you could come." Macy pouted her bottom lip.

"Yeah. I was really hoping I could come too." The eleven year old admitted honestly as he felt a flush, that wasn't from his slight fever, blossoming across his cheeks.

Then Macy got this exited look on her face "I'll tell you what. I'll set a place for you. Right across the table from me. Just in case you can come over. Okay?"

"Okay." The eleven year old felt elated that she would save him a place at the table. But at the same time he felt guilty, because that place would most likely stay empty.

When the final bell rang the eleven year old made his way to the high school once more. He was glad that this would be the last day he would have to collect his big brother's homework. Plus whatever homework that was going to have to be done over the Thanksgiving break wasn't something that he would have to figure out what to do, because hopefully his big brother would be back by the weekend.

Even though he was feeling sick, the eleven year old practically skipped the full five miles home, despite the cold, as he was happy that this was hopefully the last day that he would have to spend alone for a long time to come.

Once inside his apartment the eleven year old, meticulously set about making sure the entire apartment from top to bottom, was clean as he knew his dad would pick the place apart with a heavily scrutinizing eye when he returned home that night.

With nothing else to really keep him busy the eleven year old pulled his blanket and his pillow from his bed and went back into the living room, where he curled up on the couch with one of his books from the end table next to the sofa.

The boy read for hours, well into the night and his family, still, wasn't home. Nor, had they called.

When the clock struck midnight, the eleven year old felt that same eerie, chill that he'd felt the night his dad and big brother left, creep down his spine. But he wasn't going to let his mind take him there. He wasn't going to give into the fear. He had to be tougher than that!

So the boy ignored the chill and the knot of foreboding in his stomach and continued to read.

As he reached the last page of the book, the eleven year old gave a heavy sigh. The sun was coming up and he hadn't slept. Of course, he wasn't going to be able to get any real sleep as long as he couldn't see with his own eyes that his big brother was still okay. But that was beside the point. The boy was definitely ill and he was overly exhausted and there was nothing he could do to alleviate the, frustration that being literally both sick and tired, was causing.

Because he refused to fall asleep until his family came home safely.

By one o'clock that Saturday afternoon, the child's stomach started to make itself known.

Already knowing there was nothing in the kitchen, as far as food went, besides two slices of bread and a nearly empty jar of peanut butter, didn't stop the eleven year old from searching the refrigerator and cabinets a million times, anyways. Maybe he was kind of hoping that food would just magically appear. Or maybe he was just a tad bit frustrated that the refrigerator and cabinets remained stubbornly empty and it was kind of satisfying to slam the doors repeatedly.

Until one of the cabinets broke off it's hinges, that was. Then it wasn't so great because the kid had to fix it. And since all he had to use as a screwdriver was a butter knife, it was slow going. But at least it gave him a way to pass the time that kept his mind off of his empty stomach. So that was a plus.

When the sun set, the eleven year old's worry went up several notches. His dad had said three days. Right?

Now the boy was pacing the floor, fearing the worst. So his mind was no longer thinking about food, despite the fact that his stomach and body, obviously still were.

By midnight, the eleven year old felt queezy. Now his knees felt like Jello for an entirely different reason. The eleven year old was used to missing meals here and there because his family couldn't always afford a lot of food. But, he had never had to go a full day without food before.

He could eat the last of the bread and the peanut butter. But, then what if his dad and big brother still didn't come home the next day? Then there'd be nothing.

Maybe if he settled for half a peanut butter sandwich now, he could have another half a peanut butter sandwich tomorrow?.. Surely his daddy and big brother would be back by Monday. Right?

His daddy surely wouldn't just leave him to starve. Would he?

Maybe his daddy would leave him to starve, because he is a freak?

The eleven year old knew his big brother wouldn't stand for that. But what if Dean forgot there was no food in the kitchen and no money anywhere in the apartment to get more? What if their dad, just didn't realize that there wasn't any food or any money for food, when he had left for Minnesota?

What would happen to him if his family stayed gone for more than three more days?

What would happen to him, if they didn't come home at all?...

The eleven year old had read somewhere that it took thirteen days for a person to die of starvation, but only three to die of dehydration.

So, he knew that death wasn't imminent as long as he kept drinking water whenever he had the chance. Which was okay. Because water was all there was to drink anyway.

Looking at it from a logical aspect, helped to quell the child's fear. Yes. He could eat a half a peanut butter sandwich now and he would save the other half for a couple of days down the road. Which would buy him more time to figure out what to do. And he'd have to figure it out on his own. Because calling his uncle Bobby for help with Dean's homework was one thing. But calling his uncle Bobby and telling him that he had no food or money and didn't know what to do, would cause a world of trouble that he didn't even want to think about. And calling Pastor Jim was out of the question, because that's where his dad was and the eleven year old did not want his dad to have to deal with his weakness and whining.

The eleven year old's hands were shaking as he tried to hold the butter knife. He was actually glad it wasn't a sharp knife, because he was pretty sure that he'd end up cutting or stabbing himself on accident if it were. And he knew that he really didn't need to add, even just a little, blood loss to the mix.

The boy never knew that just, simple, peanut butter and stale bread could make him hear the 'Hallelujah Chorus.', but it did. The eleven year old had, had no idea how famished he had truly been feeling, up until he had sank his teeth into that bread.

The half sandwich was gone far too quickly and it was a true test of self-control as the child forced himself, not to use the last slice of bread to make the other half sandwich, right then. He knew that he had to make it last. Just in case.

Knowing that he either had to sleep, find another way to stay busy or risk losing his self-control and devouring the last of what little food was left, the child decided that sleep was the best option as he was pretty sure their downstairs neighbors wouldn't appreciate the noise of him trying to exercise this early in the morning. So the boy curled up on the couch with his pillow and blanket, in hopes that if his family did return home, that them opening the front door would wake him.

The eleven year old struggled with restlessness for three hours, but at four a.m. he couldn't fight sleep anymore, even if he still wanted to.

The scene grayed out and stayed that way for quite some time...

There was a flash of red.

He could hear his big brother screaming.

He could hear the invisible monster growl.

The child didn't have enough energy to wake from the nightmare. So he was forced to watch as crimson blossoms formed into rivers. Watch as gash after gash, was ripped into his big brother's flesh. He was so weak that he couldn't even scream and plead for his big brother this time.

Then mercifully the darkness swallowed him and he thought that maybe this time, he had died, instead of Dean..

When colors and sounds flooded back into the eleven year old Sammy's perception, the boy sat up with a groan.

The eleven year old had been feeling crummy for days.. But now?.. Now he felt completely awful. His nose was stuffy, the pain in his head was pounding relentlessly in time with his pulse and his throat.. His throat felt like he had swallowed a cheese grater, then a few hot pokers followed by a cactus and a bucket of sand.

When he went to get up. The child groaned again. His body hurt. Like really, hurt. He had never felt so achy in all of his short life. Of, course he had never been this sick in all of his short life either. His big brother had always taken care of him well enough to nip any illness he managed to catch, in the bud, before it made it very far. But Dean wasn't there. Wasn't there to make everything better again. So the eleven year old told himself to 'Suck it up.' and made himself move to the kitchen to get himself a glass of water. Because he knew that staying hydrated was important.

Three eight ounce glasses of water later, the eleven year old's throat still felt like the Sahara, but now he really needed to pee.

The boy spent the rest of that Sunday between bundled up in his blanket on the couch, rushing to the bathroom to either pee or vomit and practically dragging himself to the kitchen for more water, to keep himself hydrated and he spent that night restlessly fighting to try to get some sleep. It was like his body couldn't make up it's mind. Physically he was exhausted to the point of having the shakes, but mentally he was so wired because he was so afraid that something horrible had happened to his family, to his big brother, and no one had gotten around to remembering to pass the news on to him, yet. So he spent another night slipping into a light doze only to jerk awake the second any sort of image tried to project itself from behind his heavy eyelids.

Early Monday morning, the temperature, plummeted thirty degrees, making the inside of the apartment feel like a freezer.

At first the boy curled himself more securely into his blanket, he didn't really feel strong enough to stand at this point, but after another couple of hours of feeling like he was freezing his ass off, he forced himself to get up.

Shivering the eleven year old went to turn on the oven to get warm as the heater in the apartment hadn't worked for weeks, but the maintenance man hadn't come to repair it yet. The eleven year old wondered if his dad had even reported that the heater was broken to the main office like Dean had practically been begging him to ever since the temperatures started dropping really low at night.

But, like all of the rest of the eleven year old's luck usually went. Today, just wasn't his lucky day.

The oven wouldn't come on.

The eleven year old checked to see if the pilot light was out. Which, it was. And so were the pilot lights on the top of the stove as well and the boy had no way to relight them, so to keep from being gassed to death in the most literal terms, the boy reached behind the stove and turned the red knob on the gas line until he was sure that the gas to the stove was all the way off as he couldn't safely open a window without risking, breaking the salt lines and then of course there was the fact that he didn't want to freeze to death.

Well, if he couldn't warm himself by the oven, then maybe a hot bath would help to get some of the chill from his bones.

The boy turned the hot water all the way on and waited for it to heat up. Ten minutes later, he was still waiting.

The eleven year old checked the water heater and found that it's pilot light had also gone out.

The child let out a frustrated sigh as the realization of what had happened had dawned on him. Their gas had been shut off. Now he wondered just how far past due they had to be to have the gas company deciding to be heartless enough to shut off the gas only days before a holiday.

With no other way to keep himself warm the boy pulled out all of his blankets, even the one that still had the worst of the vomit on it. The good news was, was that at least the vomit had hardned enough to just be raked off. But cleaning the blanket to the best of his ability had the boy retching again as the sight of moldy, hardened barf made his stomach begin to churn. But it had to be done. The boy knew that he needed to stay warm and without the 'Barf Blanket.' there'd only be three, thin blankets to bundle up in, because the boy was not about to go into the forbidden territory of his father's room to collect more blankets and he couldn't bear going into his big brother's room and reminding himself that Dean wasn't there.

Before bundling up in the blankets the boy filled himself a glass of water and set it on the end table next to the couch just so he wouldn't forget that he needed lots of fluids.

For the next six hours the eleven year old dozed fitfully, rousing every so often to sip at the water. The child felt.. Icky.. That was really the only way he could describe it. His stomach was still churning, his head was really hurting, his ears ached, his throat was raw, his eyes were watery and his nose was stuffy. He wished that he could just curl up and die. Maybe it wouldn't be so bad if he did. It's not like his dad would miss him any. And Dean would definitely be better off, that was for sure.

The boy wrapped himself tighter in the blanket and tried to so hard to rid himself of the feeling of sharp daggers of ice inside every inch throughout the very core of every single one of his bones. He began to shiver violently from both the cold and the intense pain, radiating through his body. Why was he even still alive?.. It's not like he really mattered.. All he was, was the reason that his family would die. They would be better off if he just gave up and smothered himself inside the blankets.

That's what he would do. He would just give up. It would be for the best. Dean would never die because of him. His dad wouldn't have to be disappointed in him anymore. It could be good. His family could be free of him...

The child wrapped the blankets even tighter around himself and buried his face into the tight fold and let the darkness take him...

"WHAT?!" Present day Dean roared "What the HELL is he thinking?!.. Yeah. I get our dad was an ass, Sammy. But thinking about suicide?! Christ, Sam, you're only eleven!"

Present day Dean started to feel real fear as the scene began to ebb into darkness and he frantically began to try to tug his hand out of Angie's in true earnest as he shouted "STOP!.. Sammy, STOP, PLEASE.. Don't do this. Don't do this! Please! Sammy. NO!" The man was sobbing as everything faded to black. He'd forgotten that the eleven year old would obviously make it out of this alive. Watching the memory had triggered a deep, ferally protective response from Dean, he thought that he was watching Sammy die and he just couldn't let it happen, no matter what incarnation his kid brother was in. Whether it be an eleven year old Sammy, from an already lived through past, a twenty-three year old Sammy that had just collapsed to his knees into the mud, out in the rain after being stabbed in the back or a twenty-nine year old Sam, whose heart had already stopped beating more than twenty times over the last week and a half.

It would be easier to rip out his own heart than to witness evidence that Sam's would never beat again.

"This is a memory, Dean." Angie said compassionately "He has already lived through this. You need to focus on that and hold on to that."

"He was only eleven years old, Angie... ELEVEN!" Dean roared angrily "And he was thinking about killing himself! Don't you have any idea just how?.. How?.." Dean couldn't finish the sentence as he was overcome by harsh sobs.

When present day Dean finally composed himself, Angie let her grip on his hand slacken ever so slightly. "He'll be waking up again, soon." She said in a reassuring tone.

True to Angie's word, present day Dean was watching from the eleven year old Sammy's perspective, once again.

The eleven year old groaned as he came to. His head hurt. It hurt really bad. Apparently he had simply passed out and remained unconscious all night. Or for however long because it was light outside.

It could be two o'clock in the afternoon, in the middle of February, for all the boy, knew as he had no idea how long he'd been out for... Okay.. Maybe the middle of February was a bit of a dramatic stretch..

Unless he really had died and was now a ghost?

The eleven year old seriously doubted it. His dad might hate him, but he wouldn't just leave him to be a ghost. Not when hunting ghosts and sending them to Hell was what his dad lived for and right now he had no doubt that his dad would jump at the chance to send his soul to Hell.. Unless his dad really had never come back?.. The eleven year old shook his head to clear it. He couldn't let himself think like that. Not until he knew for sure.

The boy gave a weary sigh. He hoped the television would get some kind of signal. He needed to know what day it was before he lost his mind thinking about what today might be.

Every channel was staticy, but there was one that had a barely visible picture. And thank Heaven, it was news.

From what the eleven year old could tell, it was six p.m. Tuesday, November twenty-second and according to what he could tell from the barely visible weather map and the garbled staticy voices of the newscasters, ice cold, straight line winds had been downing trees and knocking out power all throughout the area and in certain parts of the country there were some pretty bad ice storms.. But Minnesota.. It was having one of it's warmest winters on record.. There was no reason his dad and brother would be held back because of the weather, which only meant one thing.. His dad didn't want to come back. The eleven year old was certain.

'Fine.' The eleven year old thought. If his dad was gonna ditch him and leave him to starve, then he could go quietly into the night.. But he wasn't going to do it without the mercy of a decent last meal.. Even guilty as sin, convicted murderers got a decent last meal.. And while he might not have actually committed a crime, YET, the eleven year old knew that he was already, a convicted murderer in his father's eyes as his father's venomous words echoed on a loop through his mind. Telling him, that he'd be the reason that Dean died..

The eleven year old decided that he would need something clean to wear. It would be rude to go to Macy's house smelling like sweat and vomit. Of course, it would be rude to go to Macy's house just because he couldn't afford food from anywhere else and right now, the thought of a free meal, the fact that the boy needed that one last HUMANE, thing for himself, was the only thing that was making him hold on for another day. The boy started rummaging through his dirty clothes.. Man... Some of them were just putrid!.. It had been forever since any of his stuff had seen the inside of a washing machine. There were more important things his family had needed to use the money for other than laundry. Especially HIS laundry. His dad and Dean were the ones who actually ever did any REAL work. Something that his dad never let him forget. No matter what he did.. It was never REAL enough work to his dad. It was like nothing he did ever counted. Probably wouldn't ever count.

Finally the boy found his black dress pants and white dress shirt that Pastor Jim had given him from the donation closest of his church about five months ago when he had expressed earnest interest in attending the pastor's Sunday sermons while his dad was laid up for three weeks due to an injury from a hunt gone wrong.

The eleven year old used the last sliver of bar soap and a wash rag to scrub his clothes into some semblance of clean and decent smelling, before he retrieved his hair dryer and turned it on, on high and started making repeated passes over his clothes with the heated air until his dress clothes, his dress socks and the underwear he'd managed to find were as close to dry as he could get them. Then the eleven year old found his only tie, which was probably his only piece of clothing that had already been clean to start out with, and laid his dress shirt and pants flat out on the kitchen counter to finish drying the rest of the way with less wrinkles..

When the sun set and the temperature dropped again, the eleven year old huddled up tight inside the blanket. He only had to get through one more night of this and then it could all be over.

The boy let thoughts of how he would end it be what pulled him into slumber that night, leaving present day Dean, livid as the eleven year old considered a wide arrange of methods from getting into a tub filled with water, then dropping the plugged in hair dryer into the water, to hanging himself or slitting his wrists and a whole lot of other horrible things in between.

"Make him stop." Dean whispered "Make him stop. Make him stop. Make him stop.. For the love of god.. Please, make him stop." Dean chanted as the eleven year old's thoughts took even darker twists and turns.

After the scene grayed out. Dean sighed with relief. The eleven year old Sam had finally fallen asleep.

But Dean's relief was shortly lived as the scene flashed red..

Once again the eleven year old could hear his big brother's screams. He could see the pain in his terrified green eyes as the invisible monster growled ferociously and ripped bloody gashes into Dean's abdomen..

And once again... The eleven year old was too weak to escape the nightmare. The child's breathing became panicked as he was forced to watch the last spark of life fade from his big brother's eyes, all over again. He couldn't take anymore and he begged the darkness to take him once more.

Present day Dean cursed GOD, he cursed Lillith and Azazel.. But he cursed his father and himself most of all. So much of what his little brother had been forced to go through, could have been prevented if their dad had not been so obsessed and he himself had not been so blind.

Eventually colors and sounds ebbed into the scene again and Dean snapped to attention. He knew that everything was important now.

Waking up hungry had become monotonous and the eleven year old decided 'Screw it.".. He'd be dead by Friday anyway. So what was the point of saving the last slice of bread and the last half teaspoon of peanut butter?

The boy felt a bit disgusted with himself, he was so desperately hungry that he didn't even care that the last slice of bread had grown fuzzy, grayish-green spots of mold all over it. Food was food and he wasn't going to be picky about what he was lucky enough to get to eat in what he was sure would be his final days.

And that's when present day Dean wished he could just tune the eleven year old Sammy's thoughts out, as they once again began to drift into the dangerous waters of suicidal thoughts.

Isolation.

Starvation.

Desperation.

Depression.

Fear.

Horrific recurring nightmares.

A father who got dangerously drunk and said and did horrible things.

All of that and more had drug a defenseless eleven year old boy to the brink and no one had been there to help him. No one had even known that the poor child had needed help. Because the child had suffered in silence most of the time and when he did try to tell, his words had fallen on the deaf ears of an oblivious fool who had thought their family was fine just the way it was. Present day Dean felt smothered by the overwhelming despair that was weighing in, not only his own heart with the revelations that were dawning on him, but also the despair that had been weighing in Sam's heart back then, that Sam's heart must obviously still be weighted with from time to time.

Once he no longer cared what the end of the week would bring, the eleven year old felt lighter somehow. Like he was free of a horrendously heavy burden. Like he was just free, period. He felt like he would soon be removing himself from the equation and therefore, he could never be the reason anyone died, ever. It was a sickeningly good feeling. A sickeningly addictive feeling.

He might not care that he would be dead soon, but there was an irrational part of him that still wanted to make sure all of his chores were finished. Like he was afraid that his dad would chase him into the afterlife just to punish him for not having had the good sense to complete his chores before killing himself. So the eleven year old made sure the kitchen was tidied up once again which wasn't easy with no dish soap, no clean rags and only cold water to work with. But he still managed to get it done. The only thing that was out of place was the bread bag. The boy thought it was something really pathetically sad when he couldn't even afford a decent plastic bag to potentially smother himself with if that's how he finally decided to take his own life. He was still undecided about how he was going to go about it, for the most part, he only cared about the end result, so he wanted whatever he could use at his disposal for when the time came.

The boy was once again pondering all the feasible methods at his disposal as he packed whatever stray pieces of trash or crumbs he could find into one of the plentiful, paper sacks.

And yeah. The kid was angry that there was so many paper sacks.. Because they represented how his dad always managed to afford case after case of beer and bottle after bottle of hard liquor. But still not afford to pay the damn gas bill or make sure that there was enough money for food. Oddly though.. The child wasn't angry for himself. He was angry for his big brother. His dad had been willfully neglectful of Dean and that pissed the eleven year old off to no end. He only hoped that once he was gone that someone, maybe their Uncle Bobby, would help Dean get free of their dad. Maybe even free of hunting all together.

Maybe then his death could mean something.

As soon as the entire apartment was back in order, the eleven year old just sat in the quiet living room with all of the lights off as the hours slowly passed. There was nothing else he could do but wait.

Wait as the sun set.

Wait as the sun rose once more.

Just wait.

The eleven year old just sat there alone, in the deafening quiet and waited.

When the sun finally rose that Thanksgiving morning the eleven year old stood and collected his blankets and pillow from the couch and stuffed them back into his dirty clothes bag. He wasn't going to need any of the blankets or any of the clothes anymore after today, but he still wanted for his chores to be done. His chores had to be done. No matter what..

When he was certain that everything in the apartment was taken care of, the eleven year old stripped down and stepped into the shower. Sure.. It was cold. But he knew that he stunk like sweat and vomit and if he didn't shower.. Then what had been the point of cleaning his dress clothes?

Since he had used the last of the bar soap, the boy could only scrub himself clean using nothing but the frigid water.

When he was finally thoroughly clean and also rid of the stench of his putrid body odor, he turned off the water but stayed in the tub to drip dry as there were no clean towels to dry off with. The chilly air on his wet skin caused the eleven year old to shiver as goosebumps formed over the span of his flesh.

After he was dry enough to move from the tub without trecking water throughout the apartment, the eleven year old streaked to the kitchen to retrieve his underwear and dress clothes.

Getting into his dress clothes was easier thought about, than actually done as apparently the boy had grown a few inches in just the five months since he had received the items. The pants rode high up on the eleven year olds ankles and were tight at the crotch and waist and the dress shirt was tight at the armpits and didn't reach all the way to his wrists. He looked ridiculous, like a three year old that didn't know how to dress themselves and he knew it. But he had nothing else clean and he was too tempted by the thought of turkey, stuffing, mashed potatoes and gravy to care.

What really sucked was that his dress shoes were now apparently a size too small as well, which meant that the eleven year old had to go with his battered tennis shoes. Which added to how ridiculous he felt.

But he was not just going to stay home when he had already decided to go. He had already planned everything. So everything had to happen as planned. Everything had to be just right. He didn't know how to handle things if they didn't go as planned.. If everything didn't happen, just right...

The scene faded to black again making present day Dean prepared to rant angrily. But Angie interrupted him with a raised hand as another door appeared just ahead.

The door was white and again, the numbers were beside the door frame. Meaning this was not a hotel room or a cabin, and the numbers were in good condition, meaning that it wasn't one of the many abandoned shacks they had squatted in during their childhoods. It was a house, and a decent house for once too, by the look of the door. But Dean couldn't remember having ever stayed in a decent house that hadn't been Bobby's or Caleb's as a kid. And this door was definitely not the door to either of their homes.

Present day Dean watched as a small fist raised to knock on the door and realized that he was still watching from Sam's perspective. He just didn't know when this perception of things was taking place.

A middle aged man answered the door and gave the boy a few up and down looks as if the child seemed so out of place. Then a girl's voice called out from just out of sight "Dad! That's Sam. You know, the friend from school that I told you about?"

"Ah, yes. Sam. Of course." The man replied and though his tone was polite, the air the man held about him said that he was both pompous and snide.

A girl ran to the door and said "Come on Sam. I saved you a place at the table just like I promised." snd Dean recognized her from some of Sam's memories that he had just recently witnessed.

"Hey, Macy." The eleven year old said shyly as he followed her to the table "Thanks for inviting me. I'm really glad I could come."

"Me too." Macy Williams said excitedly.

Then Macy showed the eleven year old where he would be sitting. Right next to Cindy. A girl from his fifth grade math class. He hadn't ever really talked to her much, but right now the way Cindy was smiling at him was making the eleven year old feel really uncomfortable, so he gave a confused look Macy's way and hoped she would give him some kind of clue what to do.

"Oh. Sam.. Cindy's my sister." Macy whispered across the table. Then she gave a nod as she winked at Cindy, who then gave the eleven year old Sam's thigh an unwelcomed squeeze making the boy jerk his leg away.

"Wait." Present day Dean muttered as he took in the scene. "I.. I recognize this... I recognize this from.. No.. No it can't be.. This.. This.. THIS.. Was... I don't understand.. Heaven..." Dean sputtered irately as his temper began to boil, then he growled "Zachariah... If that bastard used this.. THIS memory as one of Sam's Greatest Hits then.. Then.. Oh, god... Oh, god.. No.. Nononono.. None of Sam's memories in Heaven were good.. Were they?"

"Dean you need to understand.."

"Understand what?!.. Huh?!.. That, that bastard messed with Sam's Heaven?! Do you even realize, what that made me do?!" Dean felt the color drain from his face as it hit him, just what exactly it was that he did do. "Oh, god. What did I do?!"

"Dean please calm down. You getting this upset over something that can't be changed is not going to help your brother any."

"You're right.. Angie.. You're right.." Dean panted as he forced himself to calm down.

Dean made himself go back to paying attention to what was going on. The eleven year old Sam was obviously being made uncomfortable by not only the unwanted hand of his classmate on his thigh, but also the unending questions the girl's father was asking. Because none were questions that the eleven year old could answer honestly and Dean remembered how much Sam used to hate having to lie about practically everything in their lives.

Eventually that discomfort made the eleven year old ready to leave.. But not before he suffered the humiliation of being offered food to take home because Macy knew that his family wasn't very well off as far as money goes. So not only had Macy invited him for her sister, who had barely even spoken more than five words to him since he'd started going to this school, yet seemed to have a crush on him, but she had also invited him because she thought that he was some kind of charity case?!

If the eleven year old hadn't wanted to die before coming to this house, he sure as hell did now..

Even though his clothes had still been damp and the wind had been excruciatingly cold on the three mile walk to Macy's house, the walk back to his apartment, seemed colder somehow.. Maybe because he was well aware of the gravity, the finality of what he was planning to do not long after he got home? Maybe, maybe it was because he felt even more alone now, than he had, ever felt before?

When he arrived back at the apartment, the eleven year old, laid down the salt lines, not for his own safety, not anymore.. But he knew that if his spirit didn't move on, it would need the salt lines to contain it, until someone, a hunter, got around to taking care of salting and burning his bones. Which.. Who knew how long that could be?.. Who knew how long it would take for someone to even realize he was dead? The eleven year old went into his room and plopped down on his bed. He contemplated whether he should leave some kind of note, whether or not whatever he wrote or didn't write would matter. In the end, the boy decided against a note. He had also decided against smothering himself with the plastic bread bag, so the bread bag wound up in the paper sack with the rest of the trash. The apartment had to be clean after all. The boy had decided that he would hang himself. It seemed right to execute himself with the means he had available.. After all he was a murderer and murderers usually got executed. Right?

The child had just finished tying his cleanest bed sheet into a hangman's noose and had just gone into the bathroom to loop the long end over the metal shower curtain rod, when he heard the living room door open.

Every light in the apartment was off except the bathroom light and since he had left the bathroom door open, it was obvious where he was, but the eleven year old was frozen, rooted to the spot as he heard heavy footfalls coming closer to the bathroom door.

His face flushed crimson as his dad poked his head in the bathroom.

"Sam?.. Why do have a bed sheet in the.." Then his dad went a little pale. But the eleven year old didn't really catch what present day Dean was seeing clear as day as their dad schooled his features and told the boy to take the sheet back to his room where it belonged, but made no other remark about what he obviously knew he had interrupted, just in the nick of time.

Their dad's guilt and remorse didn't last long as the man started tearing through the kitchen cursing, and poor Sam had happened to poke his head out of his bedroom at the inopportune moment.

"Where the hell's the food?!" The eleven year old's father bellowed.

"There was only two slices of bread and a little bit of peanut butter when you left." The eleven year old whispered timidly "I ate the last of the bread and peanut butter last night. I.. I'm sorry."

When the eleven year old looked up, his dad's face showed barely veiled shock, and guilt, again.. Always with the guilt. And once again, present day Dean recognized all of it, but the eleven year old Sam was completely clueless. Then, present day Dean watched as his fifteen year old self came through the door looking like a pack mule. Their dad snapped, sounding harsher than he probably intended as he ordered the fifteen year old Dean to just toss all of the bags in his room on the bed. Of course guilt was something that John Winchester didn't handle well. Then the gruff man ordered his fifteen year old to wash up a bit, because they were going out to eat for Thanksgiving dinner.

But the hits had just kept on coming as the fifteen year old Dean had yelled from the bathroom that there was no hot water, which led to the eleven year old Sam, nervously telling his dad that their gas had been shut off since Monday morning.. Then, the fifteen year old had to go and razz his little brother by making fun of the eleven year old's clothes, and the eleven year old shouting that it was the only stuff he had that was clean, before the eleven year old was bolting for his bedroom and slamming his door out of shear embarrassment.

Present day Dean realized that his fifteen year old self hadn't known that he had just hurt the eleven year old Sam's already tender feelings, but what the eleven year old didn't know was that the only reason the fifteen year old Dean and their dad were back before that coming Saturday, was because the overprotective fifteen year old had confronted his father (Respectfully.. And there had definitely been lots of fear.. LOTS of fear, when he had done so.) with his worries about his little brother and the fact that he had known the eleven year old Sammy didn't have any money and definitely didn't have a lot of food. Present day Dean wondered if it had ever haunted his dad that they could have come home, two days, too late.. He knew it was already haunting him.. And it pissed him off that his dad had obviously known what Sam had been ready to do and yet had seemingly done nothing, to actually help the poor kid..

About thirty minutes later, the eleven year old's dad poked his head into the room and said it was time to head out for dinner. So the eleven year old reluctantly got back up and forced himself to show his face outside of his bedroom.

Once they were at the restaurant the eleven year old took notice of how many people kept staring directly at him.. HIM, specifically. The child looked down at himself.. Was it really that obvious that his clothes were too small? But present day Dean knew that it wasn't JUST the too small clothes that the people were staring at. From what present day Dean had seen the last time the eleven year old Sammy had looked in the mirror, the kid had, had dark circles around his eyes, bags UNDER his eyes, his skin had been pale, and his eyes had been bloodshot and glazed over.. The people in the restaurant were clearly looking at, staring at, a child that had obviously been neglected and from what the eleven year old Sam was seeing, there were clearly some people that wanted to confront the child's father about the matter (But the eleven year old Sam didn't recognize that, the way present day Dean was recognizing it now.)..

The child's father ordered a bucket of extra crispy chicken with a few large sides and three drinks, then the small family of three took seats in a booth at the back of the restaurant and waited for their order number to be called out.

When the food was divied up, it didn't go past the notice of the eleven year old's father as the child merely picked at his food.

"It's food, Sam. Eat." The child's father ordered.

"I.. I'm not hungry, Sir." The eleven year old whispered as his stomach churned and he felt warmth spread through his face as he couldn't bring himself to confess that he had not only gone to the house of someone his dad didn't know, which was a crime so forbidden, that it was possibly punishable by torture, but that he had also already eaten Thanksgiving dinner. And wasn't that sad?.. That he was actually feeling guilty and afraid of getting into trouble for having found a way to get some much needed food into his stomach?

The boy's father looked as if he might snap at the child, then there was a look on his face.. And then.. Suddenly the father's hand moved towards the eleven year old's face and the child instinctively flinched away from the sudden movement that he had instantly thought was going to be a slap. Which made another myriad of things pass across the chld's father's face. The eleven year old's father placed that extended hand against the boy's forehead and muttered a curse, before snapping a harsh sounding order to pack the food up and take it to go at the fifteen year old Dean who had just come back to the table after getting his drink. Then the scene faded to black..

Present day Dean could now remember how the eleven year old Sam had spent the rest of that Thanksgiving break laid up in bed with Bronchitis. He could also remember how the gas was soon turned back on, how the heater was fixed, how every scrap of laundry in the apartment had gotten washed, how the cabinets and refrigerator went from empty to packed to the brim with food and drinks, and how there was suddenly a wide variety of cough, cold and flu medicines and fever reducers inside the medicine cabinet along with some steroids there dad had 'procured' to help with Sam's Bronchitis.. He also remembered being confused about how he had managed to get "A's" on homework that he hadn't actually done and how when January twenty-fourth, of ninety-five did roll around, his dad had taken him on a hunt where he got to take point for the very first time and not long after he had killed the werewolf was when his dad had pulled a one-eighty (again) and had disappeared on him and Sam again, leaving Dean with hardly any money, resulting in the then sixteen year old Dean to get put in a boy's home for getting caught trying to steal food for his kid brother and the still eleven year old Sam to have to be sent to Bobby's. But then his dad had swooped in from nowhere, with Sammy in tow and had taken the sixteen year old Dean from that place without caring how important that last night at the boy's home was going to be for Dean.. Which in turn led to an eventually, SEEMINGLY, guilty John Winchester (As Dean was used to seeing guilt written on his father's face and he knew that, that was usually the only emotion that spurred his dad to put certain things into motion.) had given the sixteen year old Dean the keys to the Impala.. Only to disappear on him and Sam once more only a day later..

Which was proof enough for the present day Dean to realize this one truth.. That their dad, when he was fighting to get free and stay free from booze, really did try his best for his kids, that he wanted to put right the things he had done wrong while he was under the influence… But alcohol, had been the potion, with which Dr. Jeckyll, became Mr. Hyde and his dad had been addicted. Dangerously addicted and the second he gave in started drinking again (and he always gave in and started drinking again), he became a negligent bastard, and sometimes even an abusive bastard when it came to the too young Sam, depending on just how much booze the man had, had to drink… And even though Dean might not have realized his dad, had, had a drinking problem back then, he was steadfastly picking up on the pattern now.

What Present day Dean didn't know was what the two months his sixteen year old self had been gone had been like for the eleven year old Sam.

As Angie tugged Dean through the darkness they came to a door that Dean knew all too well…

It was Bobby's house.

"Winchester." Bobby had greeted gruffly, sounding already irritated . "Where's Dean?" The older hunter asked looking out towards where the Impala was parked.

The voice of a still very young Sam started to cut in on how Dean had gone out for food and didn't come back, when the boy's father issued a stern command of "Quiet, Sam." as if Sam had been some annoying little ankle biting mutt that wouldn't stop yapping.

The boy went instantly quiet as his father answered "Something came up, I sent Dean ahead to take care of it, I just need a place to drop Sam off for a few days so I can go catch up with him." The man's words sounded pointed as if there was some sort of secret underlying discussion he was having with the older hunter, but while Present day Dean actually caught that, the twelve year old seemed completely clueless.

"Sure, John. Sam can stay here for as long as you need him to." Bobby had replied and with that John Winchester was headed right back out the door.

"Idgit." Bobby muttered as the Impala roared out of his driveway and sped towards the interstate.

"Uncle Bobby?" The young Sam asked.

"Yeah, kid."

"What's going on?" Well, the kid wasn't as clueless as he had seemed after all.

Bobby could lie with the best of them when he felt the occasion called for it, but most of the time he was a straight shooter, and Present day Dean could see Bobby warring with himself on whether to give the kid the 'standard "B.S." answer' that would stave the kid off and keep him out of his hair or to be honest, knowing that he'd be dealing with a kid who'd be worried about his big brother for however long he didn't see with his own eyes that Dean was okay.

Bobby went with the straight answer. "By the way your daddy was actin, I'd say that Dean went and got himself into some kind of trouble."

"What kind of trouble?!" The young Sam practically screeched, because in their life 'some kind of trouble' could mean 'on Death's doorstep'.

"Easy, kid." Bobby rubbed his ears "He's probably gone and got in trouble with the law."

"Probably?! You mean you're not sure?!.. Does dad know?!.. I'm calling him RIGHT NOW?!" The boy shouted as he stormed towards Bobby's phone.

"Sam, Sam, no, Sam… Damn it, boy, just listen a minute!" Bobby shouted as he moved in between Sam and the phone "Just think about this for a second. Do ya really think?..."

"I need the phone now!" Sam bellowed without giving Bobby a chance to finish the sentence.

"Well, I take that as a yes." Bobby muttered as Sam dodged past him and lunged for the phone. "Do ya really think that Dean's in that bad of trouble, kid?" Was what Bobby had been about to ask.

Past Sam looked up at Bobby as he listened to the phone ring. "He's in trouble Uncle Bobby, and it's bad, I just know it!... He went out for food and then he didn't come back, then dad suddenly showed up acting all weird when I know that he was in the middle of a hunt!.. Dad doesn't drop out in the middle of a hunt for ANYTHING, Bobby… I wanna know what's going on with my brother and I wanna know now!" The boy growled.

"Okay, son. I hear ya." Bobby replied sounding slightly admonished. "Give me the phone, I'll ask the questions, you know how your daddy gets when you try to ask him anything."

"Boy, do I ever." The boy stated with a scoff as he handed the phone over to Bobby.

"Alright, Winchester. I sent Sam upstairs to unpack." At this Bobby gave Sam a wink "Now I wanna know what's going on and don't give me this crap about a job because I might have been born at morning but it wasn't this morning."

Bobby listened for a bit then shouted "ARRESTED?!" causing Past Sam to make a grab for the phone which Bobby held him back at arm's length while giving Sam a pointed look and mouthing "Calm down." to the understandably irate child. "For what?!" Bobby asked over the phone. "For trying to steal a loaf of bread and a jar of peanut butter?! Now why on Earth would he do something like that?!"

Past Sam waved his arms and pointed at himself , Bobby nodded then asked "Just how much money did you leave for the boys this last time around, John?"

The response that John Winchester gave was so loud and irate that Past Sam could hear him shouting "Just what are you saying, Singer?! That it wasn't enough?! Huh?!"

"Well, they are two growing boys and food's not exactly cheap." Bobby had replied. "So what are you gonna do about this, John?"

"WHAT?!" Bobby had bellowed "You can't do that!... Because it was just food, John! He had to have a way to feed them both because your sorry ass couldn't be bothered enough to make sure they… Oh, I know they're YOUR sons! It just seems funny the only time YOU remember that is when it serves YOU best!" Bobby shouted as he slammed the phone back into it's cradle.

The boy looked up at Bobby with tears pooling in his eyes "I'm sorry Uncle Bobby, I didn't mean.."

"Sam…" Bobby whispered broken heartedly "Kid, it's not your fault that your daddy's an ass with a capital 'A' and.. . No… It's not your fault that Dean got arrested for trying to steal food either, okay, kid? "

"I.. I.." The boy was so confused, this all felt like it was somehow his fault.

"I mean it, Sam." Bobby stated sternly, but affectionately "It's not your fault.".. The 'None of it is.' Was left unspoken, but Present day Dean heard it anyway, it was like Bobby had sensed that Sam was weighted down and plagued by a burden of guilt that should never have been his to bear.

"So, what all did dad say?" The boy asked.

"Dean's being sent to stay at a boy's home for troubled youths until he can be arraigned."

"WHAT?!" Past Sam had shouted "But it's a misdemeanor at most and this was his first offense! Dad could have Dean's sentence commuted to time served and have him out on bail easy!"

"Well, your daddy seems to think that letting Dean stay at the boy's home will 'teach him a lesson' will 'scare him straight'.."

"Dad, doesn't care that Dean stole something and you know it! He only cares that Dean got caught and how that was an inconvenience to HIM! He's probably sweating bullets right now trying to figure out a way to keep CPS from showing up at that crap-hole he calls a hotel room!"

"Sam, Sam, easy, son, getting all ticked off ain't gonna help Dean none. All either one of us can do is be here for him when Dean gets to come home."

"But, why, Uncle Bobby? You're a grown up, why can't you do anything?"

"Because unfortunately I'm not Dean's legal guardian."

"Use a fake I.D.!" The boy pleaded.

"I would Sam, but for something like this, they'd do all sorts of background checks on my assumed identity and it wouldn't take much to find out that I'm not actually Dean's dad, especially if they've already seen John in person, then I'd be in jail for fraud, identity theft and a whole long list of other charges."

The eleven year old hung his head and gave a sniffle as he whispered "It's not fair Uncle Bobby. He was just trying to take care of me, like always."

"I know, son. I know."

The eleven year old boy had spent every waking moment over the next month and a half, constantly worrying about his big brother and asking his Uncle Bobby if there had been any news on when his big brother would get to come back 'home', to which Bobby had kept patiently replying that "No." there hadn't been any news. And every moment of the closest thing he could call to sleeping, bolting upright each night from the exact same, gut-wrenchingly, terrifying nightmares of his big brother being torn to shreds, that he'd long since learned to wake from without screaming as he had long since learned to fear his father possibly taking his big brother away again, possibly for good the next time he made anyone aware of his steadily worsening nightmares involving Dean.

When the eleven year old's father finally returned, Bobby Singer had a few choice words for the man, that was for sure and then the young Sam was hunching his shoulders as he walked with his dad to the car, because he had felt that he was the reason that there had been so many angry words between the two men. Present day Dean knew that Sam was partially right, he WAS the reason there had been so much anger from Bobby's end, but wrong about why… Bobby had been angry FOR Sam, Bobby had been angry FOR, BOTH of John Winchester's children and he had been well within his right to chew the bastard who had considered being the father of Sam and Dean his 'right' simply because he had produced the sperm which sired the both of them, when in reality Bobby saw being a parent, saw fatherhood, saw being a DAD, for what it really is, a privilege that should be taken away from those who neglected, abused or in any other way mistreated that privilege and then given to someone who would cherish it and do anything and everything in their powers to live up to being worthy of it. Someone like Bobby, who had already been doing everything he could just to be there for both Sam and Dean whenever either of them really needed him.

After the Impala hit the main road going through Sioux Falls, John Winchester looked up into the review mirror and said "It's a day's drive where we're heading, so you'd better get some sleep."

"Yes, Sir." The eleven year old replied, dutifully toeing the line until he got a sense at which side of his dad that he was dealing with… The drunken, brutish, bullying monster who would either physically hurt him or verbally cut into him or the man he knew his father could be if he were sober.

The boy curled into himself and leaned against the back passenger side door and let himself be lulled to sleep by the purred out lullaby of the Impala's engine.

As the scene grayed out, Present day Dean hoped that when the eleven year old Sam woke up, it would be to a father who was at the very least, sober.

As the boy woke he noticed the Impala had come to a stop.

"Dad?" He called out quietly as he cautiously began to sit up and take in his surroundings. The Impala was pulled up next to a gas pump under the awning of a 'Gas-N-Sip' and the boy could see his father through the windows of the convenience store. A few seconds later and his dad was coming out with a sack full of what was surely to be 'road food'.

"Hey, kiddo. Ya hungry?" His dad asked as he climbed into the driver's seat of the Impala…'Kiddo'.. That was a good sign… It usually meant his dad was either sober or not drunk enough to go to the dark place that the boy was afraid of seeing his daddy in. Either way, it meant that he didn't have to worry about being hurt for at least a little while, unless one of the items in the bag his dad was carrying was a case of beer or a bottle of hard liquor.

The boy waited and watched warily as his dad fished out two bottles of soda a box of snack cakes, two ham and cheese sandwiches and one plastic fighter jet. Both Present day Dean and the eleven year old Sam released a relieved sigh as it was revealed that there was no liquor in the back and their dad said "Saw this inside, thought you might like it." and passed the toy jet back to Sam. Which was probably John Winchester speak for 'Sorry I ditched you for over a month, sorry I didn't call to at least let you know I was still alive the entire time and sorry that I never told and will never tell you the truth about what was going on with your own brother."

The eleven year old held the flimsy plastic like it was the 'Holy Grail', it was a rare event indeed when John Winchester actually bought something 'Brand New' for one of his sons and not only was it 'Brand New' it was a TOY, which was a level of rare that Dean had only seen a twice before. Once right after his mother had died and the distraught father had gotten both boys a few brand new toys because everything they had owned had been destroyed in the fire. And the other time had been when Sam was around four years old, which now that Present day Dean was aware of what happened to Sam back then he was enraged that their dad had thought that buying new toys would be all he needed to do to help the four year old Sam heal from such a devastating event. Just like how their dad had probably thought that buying a new toy would be all he needed to do to help the eleven year old Sam get over having just spent almost two whole months without the only person who meant everything to him.

It pissed Present day Dean off to realize how their dad had seemingly thought it was okay to substitute the extremely rare purchase of a new toy in place of an apology or the big brother who the child had been kept from for over a month.

But the eleven year old Sam, he had been just a child, he didn't see it for what it was, he didn't understand that the toy was his dad's attempt to buy him off, to buy his forgiveness. And Present day knew, he understood now, that back then, Sam had, had such a big open heart, that if their dad had just told the truth and said he was sorry, not only would have the child forgiven him, but it would have gone a long way to re-instilling some of the confidence and trust that the child had already been beginning to lose in his father back then.

The toy did absolutely nothing to earn the child's father even a small amount of forgiveness and it only brought the elven year old Sam a small happiness because he knew his big brother liked planes and would think it was cool, the child just simply knew how unwise it would be to voice his anger over things to his daddy, even while the man was sober.

Okay, so the kid hadn't been as clueless as Present day Dean had been assuming and he hung his head as he realized how much he had made it a habit to underestimate his kid brother over the years.

It was dark when the Impala pulled up to an older ranch style home and the eleven year old leaned out the window, not to play with his new toy, but to covertly watch for his brother. The big brother who he would never mention knowing the truth to, because he loves his big brother and he didn't want him to ever feel embarrassed or ashamed for just trying to make sure that they both had plenty of food. When the sixteen year old climbed into the passenger seat the eleven year old had to fight to refrain from throwing his arms around his brother and squeezing him as tight as possible, he had missed him so much….

"Hey, runt." The sixteen year old Dean had stated in greeting to his kid brother.

"Hey, butthead." The eleven year old replied "I missed you."

"Next time I go away for an extended hunt I'll mail you post cards, princess. How's that sound?"

"Shut up, ghoul-breath." The eleven year old replied "From now on I won't settle for anything less than souvenirs if you go away again."

"Well, that could get expensive pretty quick."

"Then you better not go away like that again." The eleven year old stated firmly.

"Yeah, guess I better not." The sixteen year old had replied.

"You still owe me at least one souvenir." The eleven year old said with a sarcastic smirk.

The sixteen year old Dean looked down at his wrist that was now adorned with two black bracelets that he had made during a 'craft session' at the boy's home and of course he had always intended for one to be for Sam. "Here, kiddo." Past Dean replied as he handed Sam one of the bracelets.

"This is the coolest, Dean. Thanks." The eleven year old sounded like he had just been given the best gift ever as the scene faded to black.

~0~

When the darkness receded, another field was shown.

This time, everything was in motion. As if, it was being viewed by someone who was running.

"Five more laps, Sam. Then start on push-ups." It was their dad's voice calling out to the exhausted runner. Who was clearly, past Sam.

When past Sam completed his last lap he got into position for the pushups.. Apparently this had already been going on for long enough that Sam had known not to ask how many pushups. It was obvious that he already knew that he wouldn't know when to stop until his dad said.

Apparently, only when he'd done fifty, was it time for his father to give him a reprieve.

"Alright, you're done for the day, go grab a shower and then get supper ready.

"Yes, Sir." Past Sam replied gloomily.

Past Sam stood under the icy cold spray of the shower, because he fully believed that he didn't deserve hot water and scrubbed himself down, cursing his weight the entire time. After he had spent three days laid up sick, almost seven months ago, he had ballooned out at his face and around the waist and thighs ever so slightly and he had only been gaining weight ever since.. Making him 'Chubby', 'FAT', 'Repulsive', 'Disgusting'.. "A disappointment.".. And a whole list of other foul things he had gotten used to hearing himself called over the last three and a half months as his dad had started constantly swimming in the 'Jim Beam', 'Jack Daniels' and "Jose' Cuervo'","Great Lakes" of emotional detachment again after only less than two full months of once again trying to stay sober. And, then, the eleven year old was immediately chastising himself for having thought mean things about his dad.

It wasn't his dad's fault that he couldn't stop drinking.

It wasn't his dad's fault that he had a 'Fat, lazy, failure' for a son.

It wasn't his dad's fault that, that, 'Fat, lazy, failure' of a son needed a good belting to remind him of what he was, of how weak he was, of how he was going to get his big brother killed, from time to time.

It really, wasn't his dad's fault. None of it was.

The eleven year old stepped out of the shower and started getting dressed, when he heard the front door to their cabin open.

"Dad?" A sixteen year old Dean's voice called from the living room. "Mrs. Laurie's car broke down again and she was wondering if you could.."

"Not right now, Dean. I've got.."

"She said she'd give you twenty bucks if you could get it to run long enough for her to get to work and back."

"What's wrong with the damn thing this time, anyway?"

"From what she described. I'm thinking her ignition is.."

"How about, you handle it, this time around, Ace?"

"Really?"

"Yeah. You know as much about cars as I do, so have at it."

"Awesome."

The eleven year old Sam finished pulling on his t-shirt and made his way to the kitchen.

"Dean's gonna be late for dinner tonight. So, you can just make yourself a sandwich and head to bed."

"'Kay, dad." The eleven year old replied as he pulled out the loaf of bread and reached inside the refrigerator for the ham.

"Oh, and Sammy?" The child's father stated with a hint of repulsion "Use the turkey. I don't want you undoing all the hard work I'm putting into getting your weight back down."

Something inside the child's mind snapped...

All the hard work his DAD was doing?

Sorry.. But WHO the hell is the one running five freaking miles every freaking day and ten freaking miles every freaking weekend?

WHO, the hell is the one doing at least twenty pushups and twenty sit-ups every other day?

WHO was the one whose diet had already been cut by almost six hundred calories each day only to be told to go for the TURKEY, instead of the HAM? Even when his calorie log book (And, oh yeah.. He was so totally keeping track.), showed that he should still be okay, even more than okay, should he take the slightly higher in calorie HAM.. That he WANTED, instead of the TURKEY.. That he did NOT want.. Because he wanted freaking HAM, damn it!

And exactly WHOSE body was this, anyway?

What if he was fine with the way he looked?

What if he was just fine with how much he weighed?

What if he just grabbed the ham anyway? And what if he decided to have a nice big FAT slice of CHOCLATE CAKE and a nice tall glass of SODA after?!

What then?.. Huh?.. WHAT, THEN?!

The eleven year old was pondering at just how to tell his dad off, he was gonna do it too.. Just watch him.. You'll see.. He was gonna tell his dad off and then make himself a damned HAM sandwich because THAT.. Is what HE WANTED.. And, then.. Then...

"Sam. Don't stand there with the fridge door open all night, I can't afford to pay to cool off the whole damned neighborhood." The child's father stated gruffly.

"It's not like it's really your money anyway." The eleven year old thought darkly. All the money that came into the household either came from his dad's MANY fake credit cards or from the sweat of DEAN'S brow.. Because in the two weeks since his big brother had been back from the boy's home, it was DEAN who somehow brought in MOST of the cash, through small, menial jobs like yard work and helping people fix their broken down vehicles for cheaper than an actual, licensed, mechanic would charge (And he knew that DEAN would want him to have HAM (Because when their dad wasn't looking, Dean would give over the (Still healthy.) higher calorie foods readily and willingly as he had learned in health class that HIGHLY ACTIVE children needed more carbs and calories to stay strong and healthy because of how much energy they needed to fuel their activities.) and it was DEAN'S money that bought all of the sandwich stuff in the first place.).. But the eleven year old, didn't voice his thoughts out loud. Instead, he grabbed the TURKEY and closed the refrigerator door then began making himself a sandwich... So much for telling his dad off…

The eleven year old finished his sandwich, cleaned up his mess and then remained standing at the counter to eat his sandwich.. Because he so did not want to sit down at the kitchen table so long as his dad was, also, sitting at the table. Okay.. So, he didn't handle feeling intimidated very well... And he was still pissed that his dad had let his big brother stay in a boy's home for two whole months.

After he finished eating half of his sandwich and wrapped the other half with cellophane and put it in the refrigerator, he cleaned up his mess making sure that there wasn't so much as a crumb on the counter or the floor. Once he was done, the eleven year old heaved out a sigh and made his way to bed, hoping for once that, when his dad found, yet another reason to hit the road ALONE again, that he might just finally decide to stay gone for good.

It's not like his dad actually did anything to take care of him or his big brother.. SO.. WHY, did they even need him for?! WHY, did he stick around, hell, why did he even ever come back at all, if all he was going to do was bitch and complain about how his two CHILDREN, being, well, children and having to go to school, got in the way of HIM, saving lives?!

If saving people from monsters was so damn important to his dad, then WHY didn't his dad just LEAVE, go out there and do his 'Saving people, hunting things, "BUSINESS".' ALONE, and just let him and Dean, go to one consistent school and be kids and live THEIR lives, away from all of the violence and the monsters and away from the damn WAR ZONE?!.. OR.. Were THEIR lives not on the list of people worth keeping safe from all of the monsters out there?!

The eleven year old plopped down on his bed with a heavy sigh as the dark and hateful thoughts about his father swirled into the gray of oncoming sleep...

The next day, was no better for the young boy. That morning, when he woke up it was to his father shouting at him to get up and do his early morning, five mile run. And by 'early' morning, that meant that his dad had decided to wake him up a whole two hours earlier than the normal time of his 'morning' run at six a.m..

According to his dad, monsters don't do things on a schedule, so he needed to learn how to be just as spontaneous in his training as the monsters that he was going to have hunt someday could be in the ways they might tear apart the lives of innocent people.

All the eleven year old heard were the words 'Tear apart the lives of innocent people.' causing him to wonder once more, why his and Dean's names weren't on someone's list of 'innocent lives', worth saving, somewhere. Why was it okay for his father to rip apart HIS and his brother's lives and throw them in front of monster after monster? Why was it okay for his father to sacrifice their lives like that? How did that make his father any better than anything that they hunted?

Those dark, brooding thoughts followed the boy as he took off running down the five mile path and by the time that he reached the end of that path all he really had on his mind was the question just what he should do now that he had completed his run down the five mile path and had found himself standing at the edge of the grounds of his school a whole two hours early. He supposed he could just turn around and jog back home, which if he had to guess had probably been his father's plan all along.

To make the 'fat boy' do a ten mile run today instead of five. No. Wait. Make that a fifteen mile run. Five, un-needed, miles to the school the first time. Five miles home after 'fat boy' realizes there was no point being at school two whole hours early, especially considering there wouldn't be any teachers on the grounds for another hour and a half and damn it, it was too freaking cold outside for someone who had no coat and only thin, worn, jeans and two thin, worn and battered flannel shirts layered over a tattered, hand me down, T-shirt and sneakers that were falling apart, screw that, he really rather NOT freeze his ass off for over an hour, because even though it was three weeks after the start of April, Spring mornings in the north could be just as frigid as any day in Winter. Which meant that, damn straight, he was headed home. Of course though, he knew that if he went jogging home that he'd have to run the five miles back to school, AGAIN and so he would have enough time to go through the front door of the ancient farm house his family was currently calling 'home' and stand in front of the fireplace for all of ten minutes, before he had to turn around and run right back to the school.

On second thought.. Screw that.. He was going to stay at the school and freeze his ass off out of shear spite and hope, PRAY, that he'd get sick in the process. That'd teach his dad to pry a sleeping CHILD, from his nice, warm, safe, bed, just to make him go out into the frigidly cold, pre-dawn without clothing that would keep said CHILD, properly warm, all to make that child run to a place that was closed and had no suitable shelter to huddle up inside of while that child waited for the place to open.

Yeah. It would serve his dad real good and proper if this new twist to the 'training sessions' made him sick. He was actually wishing for more like 'fatally ill' than just regular old sick though, because nothing short of a fatal illness that could have been easily prevented with something as simple as having less negligence and ignorance where his children were concerned, would make his father learn a lesson.

Good thing John Winchester had more than one son, though. The sixteen year old Dean had apparently decided that this was a good day for getting to school early.

All the eleven year old could think was "Thank god for my big brother."

He and Dean sat in the car with the heater cranked all the way up on high, while they waited for someone to come unlock the school.

Neither of them really said anything. Of course the eleven year old thought that nothing needed to be said. He had, had a rough morning and Dean had come to his rescue. What could he say to that when it was something so common place that he actually expected it?

Plus, if he told his big brother 'Thank you.' Dean would've probably scoffed and said 'Shut up.' in that tone his big brother always used when he was trying to dodge away from the edges of the horribly dangerous 'chick-flick territory'. No. Saying nothing at all was definitely the better way to say 'Thank you.', especially with his big brother... Wasn't it?..

Later that day the eleven year old ran out onto the big field where all of the other fifth graders spent their, thirty minute long, free period and jumped into a game of soccer with a few kids who were nice enough to him to not exclude him when he tried to join the game, but were still mean enough to him to whisper and laugh about him behind his back with the more popular kids in class, probably in hopes that they'd somehow climb up the ranks of popularity if they joined the popular kids in dissing the weird, little new kid. But he didn't know what was more pathetic, them being so obviously underhanded in hopes to be popular or him, joining them in a game of soccer in hopes that he could pretend for just a few seconds that at the end of the day these kids might actually like him, that for just a second he could pretend that he could actually have REAL friends that weren't Dean...

When Dean drove him back to the cabin after school to find that their dad had left for another hunt, but at least there was a note on the table telling the boys that he would call them later that evening.. The eleven year old wanted to drop to the ground and say a thousand 'Hail Mary's' ,like Pastor Jim had taught him when he had wanted to know how to 'make up for sinning', for having wished his dad away. Because now, more than anything he wanted his dad to come back, and come back safe.. Because, what if his dad didn't come back at all? What if whatever he was hunting, killed him instead? And it would all be, because he had wished his dad would stay gone for good..

The boy couldn't stand it. This waiting for night to fall, the waiting for the phone to ring, the waiting to know if their dad was still alright.. No.. The boy decided that he did not want his father to leave and stay gone. He wanted him to come home and never leave again, because it wasn't his dad that was the problem. It was the hunting and the booze... Those things were the problem. If he could just get his dad to give those things up, everything could be good, it could stay good, they could finally all be together and stay together and he wouldn't have to live in fear of some monster tearing his father or brother apart in the middle of some dark mountain range, where no one would find their bodies for days.. He would no longer have to live in fear of the monster that his dad became when he'd had too much alcohol..

The sixteen year old Dean started to rummage through the kitchen and the eleven year old Sam started picking through the refrigerator. By the time the brothers were done they'd prepared a time efficient dinner without having to say a word. They both knew their strengths when it came to cooking. Sam was always in charge of peeling and slicing vegetables or microwaving things that came from cans, because anything else and he'd probably either undercook it or burn it and Dean was always in charge of cooking any kind of raw meat, because no one wanted to die of food poisoning and stuff that came from boxes like macaroni and cheese or spaghetti noodles, because 'Can burn water.' wasn't just a saying or a joke when it came to Sam trying to cook anything on a stovetop..

The sixteen year old Dean waited for the eleven year old Sam to make a plate before he dug into the food himself, but it was a bit of a mute-point for them to be using two plates because the eleven year old Sam had been steadfastly leaving half of the food on his plate untouched, every single meal any time Dean was around for almost five months. Because almost six whole months ago , the eleven year old boy had realized just how bad off they sometimes got in terms of food, and then he had realized that if he had never gone to bed hungry, before his dad had taken his brother off to Minnesota, then that more than likely meant that his big brother had been going to bed hungry, a lot. And then two months and two weeks ago, the child had learned what his big brother would resort to, to try and ensure that they had food… Leaving half of his food was the child's way of making sure that so long as he had food to eat, that his big brother would also have food to eat as well, because the eleven year old Sam knew that his big brother would eat the rest of his food for him. Every meal it was the same, even during the meals when the eleven year old could clearly see that his big brother had a plate full of food, the boy still felt the compulsion to leave half of his food so that he could actually know for certain that his big brother got something to eat, because there was no way that Dean would let food go to waste. And that way, the child knew that if both of them had food, then he would never have to worry about his big brother possibly being taken away for stealing, ever again.

(Maybe the sixteen year old Dean, had caught on to the fact that his little brother was only eating half of his meals and maybe, THAT'S why the big brother made sure the kid ate some of the higher calorie stuff when their dad wasn't looking?)

When they finished eating and started cleaning up for the night, the eleven year old Sam, bumped his big brother's shoulder with his own as they stood at the sink, washing and rinsing the supper dishes, and said "Thanks for earlier."

"For?.."

"For not letting me wind up turning into a human icicle this morning."

"You're such a girl." The eleven year old's big brother replied in mock annoyance as he rolled his eyes.

"Says the girl washing the dishes."

"Bite me, bitch." Dean playfully growled as he scooped out a handful of suds and flung them at his kid brother.

"Put an 'X' over the acre, jerk.' The eleven year old said as he huffed out a laugh and grabbed the sprayer and sprayed Dean with cold water, then took off running.

The eleven year old made it as far as the living room before his big brother tackled him, snarling "You are so gonna pay for that ya little runt."

"Dean." The eleven year old laughed as his big brother grabbed him by his ankles and stood up, making the boy hang upside down.

"What d'ya say, Sammy?"

"Sorry. Sorry." The eleven year old was breathless from laughing so hard.

"That's more like it, short fry. Now, do me a favor and go mop up the mess you made in the kitchen floor with all that water you sprayed me with, before someone falls and breaks their necks."

"Okay. Should I put up a 'CAUTION: WET FLOOR.' sign, too?"

"Quit bein a smartass." The sixteen year old Dean huffed in mock annoyance.

"Better to be a smartass than a dumbass!.." The eleven year old hollered as he went running down the hall, laughing the entire way until he crossed the threshold to their room and shouted "SAFE!" like an Umpire at a baseball game, because he knew his big brother wouldn't pursue him past the door of their room, it was neutral territory, like Switzerland, after all, and 'no rough housing allowed in their bedroom' was their own self-imposed rule in this place. Because the last time they had rough housed in such cramped quarters someone had accidently put an elbow (or a knee) through some drywall, which their dad still didn't know about, thanks to a twenty dollar, temporary wall patch that Dean had found at a local hardware store.

"Yeah, you're safe. Now go mop up the mess in the kitchen floor. Before ya make me violate the Geneva Convention."

"Alright, alright, I'm goin."

"And put a thin coat of wax down too, while you're at it!" The sixteen year old Dean shouted jokingly as Sam disappeared into the kitchen.

"Sure, I'll get right on that." Came the eleven year old's smart ass reply.

Later that night the boys laid in their cramped, not even twin sized, beds (more like camping cots.. but whatever), they were both staring at ceiling and they were making up names for the pictures they could make out of the clusters of clumps on the popcorn ceiling while they waited for the phone to ring.

"Octagonas." The sixteen year old stated sounding bored. (This was his kid brother's idea of fun, after all, not his. But it passed the time as they waited for the phone to ring.)

"Seriously?" The eleven year old gave a disbelieving sigh "THAT'S the best name you could come up with?"

"It's better than what I was gonna call it.."

"Oh yeah?.. What were you gonna call it?"

"Stop Signagus." The sixteen year year old retorted, making the eleven year old snort out a laugh.

"You're right.. "Octagonas" is definitely better."

"Okay, your turn."

"Chirpy." The eleven year old said with a grin.

"What are you seein to come up with a name like that?"

"Right here.." The eleven year old stated as he extended his arm and pointed then made a circular motion "If ya look at it just right it looks like half of a broken egg shell with a baby bird poking it's head out."

"Nah uh.. Let me see." The eleven year old moved so his brother could plop down on his bed.

"See?" The eleven year old asked as he stood at the foot of the bed "It's right there."

"Oh yeah. Looks more like a baby T-Rex though. Points off because your baby bird is clearly a dinosaur."

"That's what lots of baby birds look like when they hatch butthead. Featherless, their tiny wings looking like a T-Rex's tiny little front legs." The eleven year old replied as he drew his arms to his side to impersonate his version of a T-Rex's front legs.

"Yeah but baby birds don't come hatched with rows of razor sharp teeth… So.. Points off because your bird is still obviously a dinosaur."

"What?! My bird doesn't have any teeth!" The eleven year old exclaimed. "It has a beak."

"Yeah. A beak. Filled with razor sharp teeth. It's a dinosaur."

"Oh, for cryin out loud!" The eleven year old Sam exclaimed as he climbed up on the dresser at the foot of the bed so that he could reach the ceiling. "This.. Right here." He pointed making a circle. "Is a baby bird just that just hatched from it's shell."

"Oh.. Yeah, now I see a bird. For a second there the broken part of the eggshell looked like teeth."

The eleven year old looked up and let out an exasperated sigh "Great! Now I see the dinosaur!"

"Double points for me because your picture is a part of another one and I saw the bigger picture first.."

"Then I get double points for seeing the smaller picture first, dummy."

"Fine. Double points for both of us."

"So, we're tied."

"Again." The sixteen year old replied, sounding both bored and annoyed. "This game is stupid, neither of us ever actually wins."

"Dud, there's nothing TO win." The eleven year old stated, sounding exasperated as if to say 'Seriously?'… "Hey.. You could always show me how to make a bracelet."

"Yeah?.. You wanna learn how to make a bracelet?" The sixteen year old Dean sounded enthusiastic and Present day Dean remembered a time when he had actually felt happy to know that his little brother wanted to learn something from him…. What had happened to those days?

At the eleven year old's nod the sixteen year old pulled out a small kit of thin leather straps that he had taken with him from the boy's home only four and a half months prior…

When the brothers were both done making one bracelet a piece the eleven year old looked up at his big brother and handed over the bracelet that he had made and said "Late birthday present."

To which the sixteen year old had responded in kind by handing the bracelet he had been making over to his kid brother and saying "Early birthday present." The smile Dean's sixteen year old self had received in turn had been blinding to say the least… What happened to the days when he could still make Sammy smile like that?

About an hour later the youngest Winchester was staring at the phone, still anxiously waiting for it to ring.

"Dean?.. Why hasn't dad called yet? It's already almost midnight." The eleven year old was on the verge of tears. He always worried about his dad when he was away on a hunt and he felt guilty as hell for having wished his dad away..

The sixteen year old let out an annoyed huff, this was why he had rather play the stupid 'connect the dots on the ceiling' game, or do anything else, so he could distract the kid from noticing that their dad hadn't called yet and therefore, also distract himself from that exact same thing.. "Just go ahead and go to sleep Sammy, I'll wake you up if he calls."

"But Dean… What if?.."

"Now, Sam."

Their dad didn't call that night…

Present day Dean watched from his past self's perspective as a look of hurt and disappointment crossed his little brother's face like he had already known that their dad wouldn't be calling, then the scene faded to black…

The darkness began to recede and another field was revealed. Present day Dean could hear his dad's voice yelling at Sam that Sam's lap times were actually increasing and then his dad was bitching about 'How can you possibly be getting even slower?'

Apparently Past Sam hadn't quite mastered not muttering under his breath, because the child had definitely muttered a few choice things about their dad, Present day Dean was just grateful that their dad was far away enough to not have heard.

"Twelve years old and you can't even run right." The child's father grouched as the twelve year old Sam came to a stop when he got to where his dad was leaning against the Impala.

"Dad…" The boy replied, looking devastatingly saddened by his dad's clear disappointment in him "I'm trying, I swear." he panted, sounding definitely too short of breath.

"Trying, isn't good enough, Sam." Their dad growled. "Maybe if I make you run another hundred laps, you'll figure out how important it is for you to be able to keep up a decent pace?" The man was in his son's face issuing a clear threat.

"Please…" The twelve year old begged "I can't.."

"Can't?" The boy's father repeated sounding disgusted.

"My chest hurts."

"Oh, boo hoo." The eldest Winchester stated mockingly and Present day Dean noticed just how strongly he could smell the scent of booze that was wafting off of their dad and then Present day Dean took note of how many empty liquor bottles were littering the ground at his dad's feet… The man was clearly drunk. "You think a monster's gonna stop barreling after you just because you wanna start whining that your chest hurts in the middle of a hunt?"

"No.." The twelve year old replied warily.

"Then give me a hundred more laps, now.."

The child nodded then took off running again while trying to ignore the stabbing pain that was radiating from his chest.

The boy looked over to see that his dad was timing his laps and… Oh god… His dad hadn't given a clear time limit that he wanted these laps done in… Would his dad make him run another hundred laps if he wasn't satisfied with the timing on this set?

The child was able to get sixty laps into the run, when the pain in his chest began to really make itself known.

"Dad…" The twelve year old jogged to his dad and came to a stop.. "I need to take a knee…" he pleaded.

"You need to do forty more laps… Unless, you wanna start all over again?"

"No, Sir." The twelve year old replied with a gulp as he set back out at a jog.

"Pick up the pace, Sam!" His father shouted "If you keep slacking, I will make you run another hundred laps!"

"I knew it." The boy growled under his breath as he tried his best to quicken his pace.

Thirty laps later the child was hurting… Bad… It felt like his heart was trying to rip itself in half.

And at the end of the hundred laps the twelve year old Sam felt like he was going to pass out.

"You're still too slow." The child's father stated with a drunken sneer.

Of course he was… Because nothing he ever did was ever going to be good enough for his dad… The twelve year old was shaking with exhaustion and anger as he silently pleaded with GOD to have some kind of mercy.

"You just love forcing my hand… Don't you?" His dad practically snarled.

The boy shook his head 'No.".. He knew better than to try and say anything in his own defense… Nothing he said would work anyway.

"Give me another hundred laps. And if you can't get 'em done in under an hour, you better not stop running, cause I will snatch you up and beat the ever living hell outta you if I get my hands on you." The twelve year old's father shoved a stop watch into the boy's hands and gave the child a pointed look as he ground out the words "Your time starts now."

The twelve year old took off running like his life depended on it, and in a way it really did- with his dad so drunk- who knew what the man could be capable of?

Exactly fifty-nine minute and fifty-five seconds later the twelve year old was clutching his knees and wheezing as he tried to get his erratic heart rate under control.

The boy's father began to unthread his belt from the loops in his jeans and the still wheezing twelve year old tried to brace himself… He hadn't even gotten ninety laps done within the hour and he knew that he was in for a world of hurt.

"Pull you pants and underwear down past your ass and put your hands flat against the side of the truck." The boy's father ordered sounding pissed as hell.

The twelve year old's racing heart felt like it was crashing to a halt as the boy realized that his dad was finally going through with his ongoing threat to beat his bared ass if he kept failing at the tasks set for him.

The child barely had enough time to register, just how humiliating it was to have his ass bared in front of his dad when he heard the sound of the belt 'whoosh' through the air, mere seconds before the resounding *WWWWWWWWWWHHHHHHHHHAAAAAAAAAAAAPPPPP!* that followed, for a few brief seconds the resulting pain didn't register, but when it did the boy barely had enough time to let loose with a wounded sounding yelp before the next hit landed against the bared flesh on the other side of his ass.

The child released a shaky sob that turned into an ear piercing scream as another hit landed, then another, then another… All hitting him on skin that wasn't protected by the denim of his jeans or even the thin cotton of his underwear.

*WWWWWWWWWWWWWWHHHHHHHAAAAAAAAAAAPPPPP!* The sixth strike of the belt had the boy staggering into the truck screaming "STOP!, STOP!, DAD STOP! PLEASE!"

"You really are so pathetic that you can't push past a little pain… Aren't you?" The boy's father's speech was slurred from having been drinking bottle after bottle of some of the strongest proofed liquor that the liquor stores could legally sale…

"Dad, please…" The child sobbed but his pleading cry turned into more wounded yelps of pain as his dad let loose with four more hits in rapid succession.

And even when the boy could barely stand after the tenth strike, the child's father still kept swinging the belt for twenty more hits that each unleashed their own brandings of firey torment onto the twelve year old who was shrieking in pain by the time the final hits had landed.

"Pull your pants up and get in the truck." The boy's father sounded cold and detached as he issued the command then the man cruelly ignored the child's whimpers of pain as the boy pulled his underwear and pants back up over the burning flesh of his overly tender backside then tried to sit down in the passenger seat of the truck. There was no way he could stay sitting down… It really was impossible.

"Either sit still or you'll be running the twenty miles back to the cabin."

That caused the boy to break into incoherent sobs. "Daddy, please." The child begged with a frightened sob.. He couldn't sit down without squirming, his ass literally felt like it had gotten into a fight with a welding torch and lost., He couldn't do anymore running because he would definitely pass out. And god, dear god, he really could not take another spanking right now.

"Please, please, please." The child chanted in a whisper.

"Get your damn seat belt on." The sound of his father's uncaring demand made the child's eyes fly open. He hadn't even realized he had clenched them shut. The boy was too wary to feel any sort of relief over the small reprieve because he knew his dad could always change his mind about not making him run the whole way home and even if he didn't, the child was certain his dad would make up for this one small kindness with more cruelty later.

Present day Dean clenched his free hand into a fist as the scene faded to black "I can't believe the bastard who kept hurting Sam like that, is the same man I called my dad." He hissed out in one long, self-loathing breath.

Angie led Present day Dean through the darkness and Dean noticed that the whirring sound was beginning to sound closer…

The door Angie had led him to was white and definitely an interior door.. Present day Dean realized he was watching from a young Sam's point of view once again, as the sixteen year old Dean bustled into the room asking his kid brother if he had seen his shoes.

The twelve year old gave a wide yawn and pointed to the other bed in the room "Try under your bed." . Then the boy was up and heading towards the bathroom to get showered and dressed for school.

As he stood under the icy spray of the shower the twelve year old scrubbed his skin raw, the entire time, muttering how he was fat and ugly and smelly and disgusting and repulsive.. He was beginning to hate seeing himself naked. It just felt like the fat was everywhere, that his failure, was everywhere, for everyone to see. His dad had been working so hard to get him to lose weight for over a year, after all… And he was failing his dad, he was failing his brother, by staying so fat…

"You ready yet?" The sixteen year old Dean called from the other side of the bathroom door.

"Almost." The now twelve year old called as he turned off the water and hurriedly dried himself off.

Once he was dry, the boy threw his clothes and shoes on and shouted "Ready!" as he bolted from the bathroom.

"Bout time." The sixteen year old called from the open font door "I was about to leave your ass here."

"Were not." The twelve year old huffed with an almost pout, even though he knew that his big brother wouldn't have really left him, he still felt cranky at the mere suggestion that Dean might have thought about it.

"Get your rear in gear I haven't got all day Sammy." The sixteen year old stated as he feigned kicking his kid brother's rear as Sam passed him on the way out.

As he put his backpack in the backseat of the Impala, it didn't escape the twelve year old's notice that his big brother had, had the car already started and the heater on full blast and by how toasty warm it was inside the vehicle, it was clear that it had been left to warm up for a while..

"About to leave me, my butt." The twelve year old muttered under his breath, his big brother obviously had, had plenty enough time to have taken off without him, if he had really wanted to.

"What was that Sammy?" The sixteen year old asked as he slid into the driver's seat.

"Nothin." The twelve year old replied feigning ignorance, but he couldn't keep a grin from forming on his face. The kid couldn't help it, sometimes the things his big brother did that showed him how much he was loved, brought a smile to his face.. It was nice to know that at least one person in this whole crappy universe loved him..

"You are so weird it's scary."

"Well apparently you haven't looked in the mirror, yet this morning or else you'd know what 'scary' really looks like."

"Do you wanna walk to school, shrimpy?"

"Okay! I'm shutting up now!"

"Good. Now buckle your seatbelt, the roads got icy overnight."

Yep.. The kid definitely felt loved.

School was pretty much the same as it always had been every school day since he had started kindergarten… Filled with people, who he would probably never see again, once, he left this town.

The sixteen year old Dean was getting kind of tired of it. And, yeah. Present day Dean knew he was seeing from his past self's point of view as he would recognize the ass on his eleventh grade Spanish teacher any day of the week and twice on Sunday. Ms. Gloria was a tall, dark, twenty-eight year old, raven haired woman with a slim waist and plenty of curves in all the right places and the sixteen year old Dean had spent every Spanish class, memorizing all of those curves. He'd be lying if he said that she hadn't been the center of a lot of his fantasies back then.. Okay.. Maybe even pretty recently.

The sixteen year old Dean, was lounged back at his desk, with a 'devil may care' attitude, when the principal of the high school came into the classroom and asked for him, specifically.

Once he was in the hall the principal proceeded to tell him that someone had called the school saying that there was a family emergency of some kind, but the caller wouldn't specify what sort of family emergency.

This was not the sort of news, the child of a hunter, ever wanted to hear, from anyone as the sixteen year old boy was already assuming the worst. Then, the stupid principal added, almost like an afterthought, but it was so much more important than anything she had said and she didn't even know it. "But the caller did tell me to write down these numbers and give them to you."

The sixteen year old took the slip of paper. The numbers were coordinates. The 'family emergency' was a job! His dad, was wanting him to ditch the rest of the school week to do a job!

But that posed a problem for the sixteen year old boy.. Because what about Sam?

"Did the caller say anything about my little brother?"

"You have a brother?"

Well, that answered that question.

"If you tell me his name and grade I can see that the principal of his school informs him.."

"Uh.. No.. I'll handle it." Dean replied as he started heading for the exit, leaving the confused high school principal in his wake.

The sixteen year old glanced at his watch and figured that the final bell wouldn't ring for another ten minutes, so that meant that he had time to go to the library and figure out exactly where the coordinates his dad had left was going to be taking him.

Just as the sixteen year old suspected, the job was just in the next town over, which meant that he could drop Sam off at school every day, then go out hunting and be back in time each day to pick Sam up from school and the kid would never have to know that his big brother was doing a hunt on his own.

It wasn't hard to figure out the way his dad wanted him to handle this thing. The sixteen year old gave an annoyed huff.. Well.. At least it was better than sitting through yet another one of his History teacher's long and boring speeches about The French and Indian War. It wasn't like he was gonna get to graduate anyway..

The final bell of the day rang and Dean erased his search history from the web browser then headed for the high school parking lot to get the Impala so he could swing around the corner and pick up Sam from the front of the middle school.

When Sam slid into the passenger seat he gave no indication that he was aware of how closely his big brother had felt they had both come to living one of their worst fears. Which meant the kid knew nothing of the 'family emergency' that the high school principal had recently informed the sixteen year old of. And if Dean had anything to say on the matter, then Sammy wouldn't ever know.

The next day, the sixteen year old Dean dropped the twelve year old Sam off at the front of the middle school then headed for the next town over to figure out whose vengeful spirit was terrorizing a family of six out at one of the old houses in the country.

He interviewed the family and was glad that they had already been expecting him as it meant he didn't have to go trying to convince them that the F.B.I. really did have a junior program, they just didn't openly advertise it and yes he was old enough to be working in the field alone.

No, these people had actually found out about his dad through a friend of a friend's second cousin or something like that and his dad being already busy hunting down something that had more range than a 'simple' vengeful spirit and was thus needed more THERE than here, he had told the nice people that his son 'would handle it' in his stead.

So there the sixteen year old Dean was, scanning the place top to bottom with the E.M.F. Meter and trying to ignore the young matriarch of the family's comments of "He's just so young.", "He can't be that much older than Bridget.", "He's too young, how can he possibly help?", "I thought the man said his son was a professional, how can he be a professional? He looks like he's barely even sixteen, if that."

The only comment he had made in return was "Actually, Ma'am, I'll be seventeen in two weeks and I've already been doing this sort of thing for years now."

The woman didn't say much after that.

The sixteen year old Dean interviewed the family members so he could figure out who was being targeted the most by the obnoxious, but clearly, not really vengeful, spirit as if it had really been a vengeful spirit than at least one person out of the nice six person family would be dead by now.

It turned out that the person the spirit targeted the most was the couple's oldest daughter, Bridget and all the spirit had really done to her was appear to her and scare the crap out of her, but it hadn't actually tried to hurt her.

According to Bridget, the spirit looked like a little girl who looked to be about ten years old and she was wearing a really old fashioned looking dress.

A quick search in the small town's library revealed that back in the eighteen hundreds a couple had lost their nine year old daughter to pneumonia in the same house Bridget's family was living in.

So.. He had found out who the spirit used to be and where she was buried. Now all he had to do was dig her up then salt and burn her bones so she could move on. BUT.. It was already two thirty, which meant that he had to go get Sam and that digging up and salting and burning the bones of one Alisa Wilder was going to have to wait until the next day.

It hadn't even been a full day of relatively easy work (When one considered how hard his line of work could really be anyway.) and already he felt worn down.

Maybe it was the fact that he had to do it alone.

Maybe it was because he knew that eventually he was gonna have to give up school, give up his hopes and dreams for hunting like he knew his dad wanted.

Maybe it was the fact that he felt he had to keep this particular hunt a secret from Sam.

Maybe it was all of the above…

But as the scene faded to black, Dean knew that this hadn't been the last hunt his dad had sent him on alone at that age. He had known that eventually he had needed to figure out what to do with Sam because the hunts had gotten more difficult, more time consuming and he had, had to find someplace he could leave Sam for possibly hours on end so that those hunts could be taken care of.

The darkness had lasted quite a while, before another door appeared in the distance.

This door was dark blue, and had the number twenty-three on it. The paint on the door was chipped and there were spots of rust around the clearly damaged door knob and door jam that looked as the door had been subjected to a few kick-in entries in the past.

It was yet another hotel.

Dean opened the door and stepped over the threshold, into a hovel of a room that had thread bare light blue carpet that was riddled with splotchy bleach stains and dark patches that had probably once been puddles of a few different kinds of unsavory bodily fluids. There were two beds that were covered with thin, dark blue, hotel room comforters that had light blue designs that were probably once intended to match the color of the carpet.

Disgusted with how he had continuously allowed himself to be contented with the simple fact that they had at least had a roof over their heads. He should have demanded more from the man who not only claimed himself their father but their commanding officer as well.. He was pretty sure that commanding officers with any military branch (Well, with any military branch that represented the United States or most any other civilized country, he was sure.) were required to provide suitable lodging for their soldiers in training. And the hotel room he was looking at now was not suitable, by any means, the entire room was a health hazard, with black mold growing on the corners of the ceiling, where rust colored water stains decorated what had once been the white ceiling tiles.. The place should have been condemned.. Come to think of it.. It probably was condemned. Present day Dean wouldn't be surprised if this was one of the many abandoned hotels that littered the desert country-side along the backroads, just off of Route Sixty-Six. There had been plenty of times where they'd stayed in places like that as kids. It would have proven to be free lodging that had free electricity and everything, once either he or his dad had rigged the fuse box to accept power from a live car battery and had also jimied the water shut off valves outside to turn the water back on.

Dean wondered whose perspective he was seeing things from now, his past self's or Sam's and he also wondered when the memory he was witnessing was taking place.

When what looked to be a still sixteen year old Past Dean came from the bathroom, Present day Dean guessed that he was seeing things from a still twelve year old Sam's perspective.

"Dude, where's dinner?" The sixteen year old Dean asked with apparent confusion on his face.

"Dad's fake card was declined.. Again." Past Sammy replied with an angry huff.

"It was time for another new one anyway." The sixteen year old Dean said as he ruffled Sam's hair.

"Yeah. Except now every restaurant and grocery store in the city knows BOTH of our faces, Dean! What are we gonna do for food till dad gets back?"

"Relax, Sammy." The sixteen year old Dean replied with a hint of fondness in his tone. "There's always cash."

"That would be great if we had any cash, Dean!"

"Oh, ye of little faith." The sixteen year old Dean grabbed his jacket from the back of a chair and rummaged around in the pockets until he held up a handful of money.

"Where did you?.. How?"

"What exactly did you think I was doing, when I skipped school today? I went and played pool, lots of pool, kiddo and from now on, that's what's gonna help keep us in the green."

"Holy crap, Dean! That's a lot of money!"

"I know. Right?" The sixteen year old Dean sounded so proud of himself.

"Sooo.. We have money.. Okay.. Now what?"

"Easy, genius. We go get some grub."

"From where?.. In case you missed everything I just said. Dude, all the restaurants and grocery stores in the city already know both of our faces."

"Not ALL the restaurants know both of our faces."

"Really.. Exactly which restaurants?"

"Come on, kiddo. We're goin out to eat."

When the sleek, black Impala pulled into the parking lot of a restaurant that was painted bright purple and had green neon letters that spelled out "Plucky Pennywhistle's Magical Menagerie." and there was a colorful and brightly lit, smiling clown's face next to the entry.

"Deeeaannn." Past Sam whined. "This place is for little kids!"

"Well, I hate to be the bearer of bad news, Sammy. But you ARE a little kid."

"Oh, god.. Somebody, please kill me now." Past Sam huffed as he mocked plunging an invisible knife into his own heart.

"Quit being such a spaz." The sixteen year old Dean stated with a roll of his eyes. "This place is perfectly fine. Look, it even has an indoor play place and an arcade. Ya gotta admit that, that's pretty cool."

Past Sam gave a snort "Yeah. If you're five. I'm sure it's the happiest place on Earth."

"Dude, that's Disneyland."

"You know what I mean!" Past Sam growled, but he couldn't help the smirk that broke across his face.

"Come on, Sammy. I hear this place has plenty of pizza and ice cream to go around."

'What about the diet dad wants me on?" The younger boy asked.

"It won't hurt for you to cheat a little." The sixteen year old replied with a smirk.

Once they were inside, past Sam looked around and felt a bit idiotic at the fact that there were so many SMALL (Like really, REALLY.. SMALL.) kids running amuck.. From what he could tell.. There wasn't a child there.. Other than him and Dean, that was older than seven.. Maybe eight. He made sure to toss a pointed glare in his big brother's direction, to which the seventeen year old Dean sheepishly replied.. "What?.. I know, I know.. It's not exactly 'ideal' .. But they're gonna have half off their prices and stuff all week long, because they had their "Grand Opening" yesterday.. So, I figured it wouldn't hurt to check it out.. Plus.. I found coupons in the newspaper. With those, plus the half off prices.. Dude, we'll be eating for practically free, ALL WEEK!.. It can't get any better than that."

"I guess it's not, SO BAD." Past Sam replied with a huff "As long as we can try out some of the video games." He hinted ever so obviously.

"Here, kiddo." The sixteen year old Dean said as he held out a ten dollar bill "Go knock yourself out. 'Kay?"

"Awesome!" Past Sam exclaimed as he bolted away to go find a token machine.

About two hours later, both boys were stuffed to the brim with pizza, ice cream and soda and they were both happily 'trying out' every game in the arcade.. Some more than once.. They collected a whole slew of tickets and picked out some pretty decent prizes. An army man that came with it's own parachute, something called "GAK!" that looked like a cross between "Playdo" and snot (Really runny snot.), a deck of miniature cards that fit inside a case that could go on a key ring and a cool little art kit that came with a small box of crayons and eight coloring sheets that had pictures of each of 'Plucky's' different clown friends on them and even one of "Plucky" himself. All in all, it was really great day and even present day Dean could tell how happy, past Sam was...

In fact, past Sam, was SO happy.. He started talking about their day and didn't wind down until he literally passed out, later that night.. Of course, that could have just been the sugar rush from all of the ice cream...

The scene grayed out and when color and sounds flooded back in, past Sam was getting shaken awake by the seventeen year old Dean.

"Hey, Sammy?" The sixteen year old said as he shook his kid brother's shoulder.

""Deeeaann.. It's a Saturday." Past Sam whined.

"Yeah.. Well, I was thinking. That since you liked hanging out at Plucky's so much yesterday, you could do it again?"

"Really?!" Past Sam was up in a flash "I can't WAIT to have another go at 'Outlaw Hunter'.. I'm so totally gonna kick your butt this time!" He boasted excitedly. "I've figure out a strategy.."

"Sam.. Sam.. Whoa, kiddo.. I can't stick around.. Not today, anyway.. See, I gotta go out and make more cash." Present day Dean felt a pang of heartbreak as he recognized the glint of shear disappointment in Sam's eyes.

"Well, I can come with you."

"No.. No, way, Sammy. You are way too young to get into any of the pool halls that I go to."

"You mean bars, don't you?.. Dean.. You're too young for those places too."

"Not according to my fake I.D., I'm not."

"If you get caught.."

"Relax, short fry, I won't get caught."

"You better not." The twelve year old had to suppress a shudder as he remembered how miserable he was when Dean had been sent to the boy's home, and he could only imagine how badly Dean would be punished if he were caught in a bar, especially now that he was only days away from turning seventeen which meant that in some places he could be charged as an adult for various crimes.

"Hurry and get dressed so we can get goin."

The sixteen year old Dean walked just far enough into the door of "Plucky's" to get his hand stamped with a blacklight stamp that matched past Sam's and to make sure that Sam had a name tag, that had Sam's name and the phone number of an emergency contact, that the restaurant required children from ages ten to fifteen had to wear as a safety precaution, if they were going to be at the restaurant without someone sixteen or older so that the workers would know their names and who to call in case of an emergency. Then he handed Sam a fist full of one dollar bills and headed back out again, leaving Sam alone at Plucky's for whoever knew how long...

For the most part, past Sam had a good time. He played a lot of 'Outlaw Hunter' and Skeeball and he eventually forgot that he was the oldest kid in the 'kiddie themed' restaurant. Well, for the most part.. The only dark spot in his whole day was when some guy got in his face and practically growled "Aren't you a bit old for a place like this?" all because his five year old (Or he assumed it was his kid, anyway.) wanted a turn at playing 'Outlaw Hunter'.

And honestly.. It made past Sam a little pissed off.. Because there hadn't been a sign outside that said anything like: "Must be younger than.. *blank*… To play the video games." OR "Must be shorter than.. *blank*… To go inside the arcade."

But he was still taught to respect his elders, so he answered "Well, I'm twelve, Sir.. But according to my big brother.. That means I'm apparently still, just a little kid."

"Whatever. Just stop hogging the game." The man had stated venomously.

Which last time the twelve year old Sam had checked.. There hadn't been any rules that said he couldn't stay on one game for as long as he wanted, or as long as his tokens didn't run out.. But.. Whatever. He knew how to share. So he collected his tickets and stepped away from the machine.

But, apparently the five year old and his dad, didn't know how to share because even after three hours the five year old's dad was growling at anyone who so much as even looked like they were going to ask for a turn at the game.

And guess who was the one playing?.. Well, it wasn't the five year old, that was for sure.. Which was about the saddest thing the twelve year old had ever seen.. Some fully grown guy.. 'Hogging' a 'little kid's arcade game (AFTER, having just chased away a 'kid' for being too old to even be in a place like this and for not sharing, mind you.) while his five year old was left to roam about the arcade, unsupervised..

But other than that tiny little rain cloud, Sam's day had been great.

The twelve year old had found other arcade games that he liked.. Like: 'Hoops a Million' which was a timed basketball shooting game, where the hoop kept moving, side to side and back and forth.. The twelve year old Sammy had really racked up the tickets on that game, because he was self-admittedly AWESOME at basketball.

When his big brother came to get him later that day, the twelve year old, was actually reluctant to leave.. And boy... Didn't THAT make him feel like a little kid?.. But that was the magic of a place like "Plucky's".. No one judged you or griped at you for goofing off or playing around or being lazy there (Well, the one guy with the five year old, couldn't really count as someone who mattered.. So the crap he had spewed had meant absolutely nothing to the twelve year old.).. It was a place where he could actually be 'just a regular kid' for a change and not feel insecure about it in the slightest... And that meant a lot to the twelve year old Sammy.

"So, d'ya have fun?" The sixteen year old Dean asked.

"It was a BLAST! I had like, six free ice creams!"

"Please tell me that wasn't all you ate."

The twelve year old rolled his eyes "I had pizza and soda too, Sherlock."

"Just checking.. As long as you don't ralph in the car. We're good."

"You're so gross!"

"No, your face is gross."

"I think you need to look in the mirror, if you wanna see really gross!"

"Shuddup an gettinthecar." The sixteen year old said with a laugh as he tried to pull off sounding like 'Rocky' the 30's era crime boss from the 'Bugs Bunny' cartoons..

"I'ma gettin, I'ma gettin!" the twelve year old Sammy giggled, trying to sound like 'that wascawy wabbit' as he slid into the passenger side seat of the Impala. .. Well, MOST of their early education, HAD come from 'Looney Tunes' after all...

Once again, the twelve year old couldn't stop talking about his day.. In hyper-speed, no less.. The sixteen year old Dean decided that he needed to put a limit on just how much ice cream and soda the kid should be allowed to have whenever he got to go to "Plucky's" from then on...

The scene fade to black and present day Dean was so busy racking his brain, trying to figure out WHAT it was that was supposed to have been important from what he had just seen, that he almost didn't notice the comforting 'Whirring, Whooshing' sound.. But he knew better than to ask what had been important about what he had seen, because he had a feeling that Angie would show him, soon enough...

~0~

Soon, there was another door just ahead, Present day Dean recognized this door. This door was from a time that was three full months, six states, eight towns, four cities and two 'Plucky's' later than the last memory he had just seen.. And it felt weird that he knew that.. Because.. HOW, did he know that?.. Just on instinct like that?

Whatever the reason was, Present day Dean somehow knew that whatever memories he was about to see next were going to be life-changingly BIG..

The door was yellow and had the number six on it.

Meaning that this was most likely another hotel room.

And.. For crying out loud!.. Just how MANY hotel rooms had they lived in as kids?!.. Man. That seriously, just wasn't right. And Dean wishes.. Oh, how he wishes he could have actually seen that then.

Okay. Well. Maybe he had seen it. And now he's just wishing that he had, had the balls to stand up to his dad and done something about it. (Actually stand up to him.. Not timidly try to manipulate things from a more unnoticeable advantage.. But actually had gotten in his dad's face the way Sam always used to do.. To have actually used that rebellious streak he had gone through to actually DO SOMETHING.. Crap.. Well, at least now he understood why, his little brother had ALWAYS been picking fights with their dad, a bit better than he used to.)

Present day Dean, took a deep breath and opened the door. The air smelled like mold.. And wasn't that a commonly running theme with almost all of the places they had lived in as kids by now?.. So, not only was it a hotel room, but it was yet ANOTHER, CRAPPY hotel room. And if the stench of mold and mildew hadn't given it away.. The sight of the room itself certainly did.

The carpet was beige.. Or Present day Dean was hoping it was beige, because it could have once been light gray and that oddly yellowish tan color could just be one giant urine stain (or a whole bunch of urine stains combined) and it really could be urine stains, because the air did sort of smell a bit like piss as well, and present day Dean really didn't want to think about the other odors, but he was pretty sure he could smell something that smelled like old cat crap and other various litter box fillers hanging in the air. Oh.. Right.. This was how he had found out he was allergic to not just cats themselves but apparently whatever fur and dander and hormonally tainted piss they'd left behind because some lady hadn't given a crap about the hotel's 'no pets allowed' sign and go figure SHE had been the last tenant to stay in the room before the Winchester family had rented it. But luckily, the extent of the allergies had just been sneezing, coughing and watery eyes.. So, they had stayed in that room instead of seeking another... Because it's not like he had broken out in hives or had swollen up so badly that he couldn't breathe or anything. Right? Or at least that was his poor excuse for a dad had said.

Well, at least present day Dean knew where and when he was.. The 'Sandy Shores Inn' in Galveston, Texas sometime just after the start of March in nineteen-ninety-six.. Now all he had to do was figure out, whose view he was seeing things from, because IF he could remember this place so clearly, then there was a very good chance that this was HIS memory and NOT Sam's... But there wasn't like there was anything he could do about it with Angie's powers on the fritz.. Sooo... He was just going to have to wait until he was in a memory that he knew for sure was Sam's before things could move along in this journey he was taking through Sam's memories.

It turned out, that he didn't have to wait long as a seventeen year old version of himself came in through the hotel room door saying "Don't get out of your school clothes. I'm dropping you off at Plucky's. We're leavin in five, so get your homework together and get a move on."

Present day Dean could feel the twelve year old Sam's exasperation as Sam "Dean." The twelve year old huffed "I just got home from school, like five minutes before you got here. I don't wanna go to Plucky's, I've been there EVERY NIGHT these past two weeks! Can't we just?..."

"Get a move on. NOW, Sam." The seventeen year old Dean ordered callously and damn, if he didn't sound like a carbon copy of his dad.

"Dean."

"Now, Sam. Or just leave the homework here and not get it done.. I don't give a damn either way."

"Dean.. Achievement Tests start tomorrow. I need to study, plus finish my homework and Plucky's is too noisy.."

"Why would I give a crap if you flunk?! It's not like anything you learn in school's gonna matter!."

Present day Dean winced at the words of his past self, HE knew that his past self was simply just cranky that his own academic career was slowly circling the drain due to all of the skipped school and failing grades, there was even talk of him being held back a grade because of it… And his dad literally demanding that he miss school to chase after hunt after hunt or the fact that his dad hardly ever left enough money to last forcing his past self to have to skip school to go off to pool halls and shady bars to try to play pool or darts for enough cash to feed two rapidly growing and developing boys and also keep a roof over their heads as well as keep enough gas in the Impala to get everywhere both he and Sam had always needed to be, hadn't helped Past Dean's mood any… But that didn't mean that Present day Dean didn't want to kick his past self's ass for taking his bad mood out on Sam… Holy crap, the kid had only been twelve! It hadn't been Sam's fault that their dad had been a complete douchebag to his own kids when they were struggling to just live as best as possible despite the hell and the almost constant warfare that John Winchester had continuously drug them through..

Man, he wanted to seriously kick his own ass so bad! From what he had seen Sam had already been prone to suicidal thoughts and attempts and there his seventeen year old self had been basically telling the kid that the one thing that Sam excelled in and took pride in had absolutely no point! Just what the hell had he been thinking back then?!

The twelve year old Sam gave the moody seventeen year old one of his best puppy dog eyed looks as he tried to make his brother see reason "But Dean I really need.."

"No one gives a crap what you need Sam! Get your stuff together and get in the car, NOW!"

Oh.. Dean remembered this.. His dad had called hours earlier, bitching that Dean's school had called with threats to send the Truancy Officer out after Dean if Dean didn't start showing up at school on time and staying through the whole school day.. As if that had somehow been Dean's fault.. It's not like he had been able to be in two places at once!

But his dad hadn't cared about that, he had found a way to blame Dean anyway, while ranting about how now they had to move again. John Winchester had bitched and raved and snapped that he wanted Dean's ass in school on time the next morning or there'd be hell to pay and that he wanted Dean to play whatever sympathy cards he could manage and do whatever he had to do, to keep the damn Truancy Officer away from the hovel of a hotel that he was forcing his two underage sons to call home until he could make it back and re-locate them somewhere else.. That was why the seventeen year old Dean had been in such a foul mood… Past Dean had known that to move, his family needed a decent wad of cash to travel on, plus enough to get them into whatever place that they could reasonably afford with nothing but the meager change that Dean could rake in by hustling pool and darts, because Dean had known that the odds of his dad leaving more than five hundred dollars to last a whole month was somewhere in the range of 'no chance in Hell'…

Present day Dean knew that three days after what he was seeing his dad would come back smelling like a brewery and ordering them to pack up their stuff, the twelve year old Sam would argue that he was right in the middle of a week's worth of Achievement Testing, causing their dad's temper to go nuclear which had been the very first time that Sam had gone off on their dad, the argument had been one of the most explosive things that Past Dean had ever seen and Present day Dean knew that, that had only been the first of many meltdowns between Sam and their dad…

What Present day Dean didn't remember was, that there was so much more to it than that….

Dean watched from his own perspective as he dropped a very disappointed looking Sam off at one of the noisiest places on Earth without even caring that Sam wouldn't be able to concentrate on finishing his homework or studying for the upcoming Achievement Tests. Sam trudged into the Plucky's and Past Dean hadn't even followed behind him to get a matching blacklight handstamp or to make sure whether or not Sam actually wore the nametag the restaurant made him wear, talk about slacking on his responsibilities. Present day Dean felt his heart break as he remember bitching Sam out for ditching his responsibilities when he was bearing witness to where all Sam had learned such behavior from.. Their dad had ditched the responsibility of actually raising his sons to go running off after various monsters or he had ditched being responsible for his own children all the times he had drug them into a warzone where they always faced the possibility of being ripped to shreds by the most vile types of creatures imaginable. And Dean had in turn repeatedly ditched the one responsibility that he had always claimed mattered more to him than anything in the world, he had ditched Sammy all because following his dad's orders had been what came first for him, not Sam, not really, despite the lies he had constantly tried to tell himself, if he had really meant to put Sam first then he would have packed Sam up and hauled them both to Bobby's doorstep the second he had, had a set of wheels of his own to get them there. If he had really meant to put Sam first he would have made damn sure to get Sam away from hunting and monsters. He would have gotten Sam away from their dad and he would have done more to give Sam a safer, more normal life in one school district, he would have supported Sam's ambitions and he would have done everything in his power to help make Sam's dreams come true. But he hadn't done that, instead he had defended his dad and the lifestyle that he was forcing them both to lead, at every turn and he had always managed to find a way to get on his high horse and kick Sam down and jump at the chance to spout accusations of 'selfish', 'UNGRATEFUL', 'irresponsible' and 'you abandoned your family', each and every time he had, had a chance…

What sort of person, what sort of family, what sort of BROTHER, does that?...

Present day Dean was fairly certain, that it wasn't a good one.

As he watched from his past self's perspective his seventeen year old self was just now pulling into the parking lot of one of the skankiest, skeeviest, bars Present day Dean could ever remember seeing, it was the sort of place that a seventeen year old had no business being in, hell he had, had no business being in a bar back then, period. And it wasn't as if he had wanted to be there and he damn sure hadn't gone to drink, but he had known that his small family's supply of cash was running low and that he was the only one that cared enough to actually do something about it in order to support ALL THREE OF THEM, instead of just making sure that there was enough money to keep only his dad in ammunition, booze and fuel for his truck, which was all his dad had really cared about back then, Present day Dean understood that now, he just wished that he could kick his past self for having been in such deep and profound denial back then…

The seventeen year old Dean sauntered into the bar and scoped the place out, there were two pool tables and a dart board, so he had decent odds of walking out with a good sum of money if he played his cards right. After watching a few guys playing pool he spotted one that would be easy pickings, drunk and egotistical, exactly what Dean needed. It would be as easy as taking candy from a baby.

Or so he had thought.

He had won three games against 'Mr. Easy Pickings', then 'Mr. Easy Pickings' had tempted Dean into a fourth game where Dean could 'easily' double his winnings.

Turned out that it was Dean who had been the easy pickings of the night, well, at least the seventeen year old had discovered how it felt to be hustled for every last penny that he had.

But it had also left the seventeen year old with even less cash than he had, had going into the bar which hadn't helped with the boy's depressed mood or already riled temper.

Then, there she was, this old woman with rust colored hair and a few missing teeth. She had crept up onto the seventeen year old while he was brooding in a corner of the bar and she had whispered all sorts of filth to him about how he looked like sex on legs, then she had asked him if he was available to have some fun for the night.. And the seventeen year old had been all 'Sorry lady not interested.' Until the woman confessed that she had watched Dean lose his money at pool and that she wouldn't mind helping to make up for the loss as she flashed a wad of cash at him and said "You're so hot you can name your price, sugar. I'll pay it just to have a go with a pretty boy like you."

The teen had been nervous, but knowing he didn't have a lot of options, he had accepted and nothing had ever made him feel so filthy as what he had done to earn every single last penny that he needed to keep his family in the green for quite a while, all from that one woman. And the woman had turned out to actually be a pretty decent human being (which Dean could only imagine how much worse he would have felt if she had been a bitch) who had guided the shaky seventeen year old through his first… Everything, (well, except for love and kissing, she had told him that no self-respecting 'professional' would allow their 'clients' to kiss them on the lips) she had known that he was new to the game but she had also sensed the heavy burdens of his life so she had given him the sage advice of someone who had been in his shoes. She had even told him all the safest ways to 'work' the streets because she had just known that as much as the seventeen year old Dean would want it to be, that it wasn't going to be just a onetime thing, and she had been right. Then she had slipped Dean a little more than a thousand dollars and told him not to get used to getting such a big score off of only one 'client', the only reason she was giving him so much was because she had been his first, literally and because she had recently had a run of good fortune and he had seemed worth sharing that with, and it hadn't hurt that he was hot and had looked like a lost puppy when she found him. After she had paid him, she had wished him well, told him to get his life together as fast as possible and then get himself off the streets, because it was a hard life (he was lucky he was pretty, that would make working the streets so much easier, she had told him) and he needed to be well away from it and on to better, more safer things before he reached her age or else he'd never be free of it, then she had disappeared into the night, leaving the seventeen year old wondering whether he had just been saved by the life that she had shown him was possible or condemned to it…

Either way, it had sullied the seventeen year old Dean's mood even more, yeah he had a pocket full of money, and yeah the woman had been good to him, but he had just sold his virginity for a thousand, two hundred dollars in cash, to a (supposedly) retired hooker and it had made him feel used and dirty, all because of how he had, had to be the one responsible for taking care of things when his dad wasn't around and ... His dad wasn't ever really around…

The seventeen year old's anger and resentment had been building up for some time and it had built up so much by then that anger and resentment had become the only feelings that the seventeen year old could actually feel anymore, everything else was buried so deeply beneath it, that it was being smothered out… Yet the seventeen year old wouldn't blame his dad…. It wasn't his dad's fault, it was never his dad's fault… No.. The person the seventeen year old resented most, was the angriest at, was SAM. Sam who was spoiled, selfish and inconsiderate…Sam, who was always screwing everything up. SAM, who wouldn't stop growing and always needed new clothes or shoes… Sam who was always hungry… Sam who was ruining his life…

By the time Past Dean had pulled into the parking lot at Plucky's he had, had so much time to stew in his anger and resentment that the poor twelve year old Sam had, had no clue, that what he would be facing as he got into the Impala was not the same Dean he had always known and loved. This Dean couldn't be bothered to give a crap about how his twelve year old kid brother felt about anything and he damn sure didn't want to listen to the annoying sound of his voice, hell, he could barely stand to look at his face. And Sam.. The twelve year old could sense the tension and anger rolling off of his big brother in waves and all he had wanted was to help Dean.

But when the twelve year old Sam had asked what was wrong… He had suffered such a vicious verbal decapitation that even his dad would have trouble matching the brutality of it. Dean had literally bitten his head off, causing the twelve year old to curl into himself and hide within his virtual shell.

"God, I was such a bastard to him!" Present day Dean exclaimed as he watched through the twelve year old Sam's perspective as the Impala pulled up outside their crappy hotel room and the younger boy trudged inside feeling like he had just lost his only friend in all the world, then he looked at Angie "I know I was 'still just a kid' and that I was 'stressed', but so was Sam, he didn't deserve for me to treat him like that… I was supposed to be his big brother… I was supposed to be there for him just as much as he was trying to be there for me… But all I could see back then was only how much I was hurting. I never saw how much pain he was going through…" Dean stated sounding on the verge of tears.

Then Present day Dean let his attention go back to what the twelve year old Sam was seeing and feeling.

Man, there had been such a mix of emotions for the poor kid, but one of the most predominant things that the kid had been feeling back then was confusion… And… It broke the thirty-four year old Dean's heart as he realized just how much fear that Sam had been feeling just because of the way his seventeen year old self had been acting toward the kid. The poor child had been afraid, not of his brother getting violent, he could take a beating, and he would have taken a beating if it would have made Dean forgive him for whatever it was his big brother was mad at him for, which served to make Present day Dean feel like even more like the lowliest of scum, because no the twelve year old wasn't scared of the physical pain of a potential beating, the kid had been TERRIFIED that his big brother had finally decided that he wasn't worth loving anymore, just like his daddy had a long time ago...

The twelve year old Sam crawled into bed feeling alone and unloved and as the scene grayed out, Present day Dean's heart was torn to shreds as he felt how devastated the kid had been back then.

When colors and sound came back Present day Dean knew whose point of view he was seeing things from as the twelve year old Sam was the one who had, had the bed closer to the restroom. The twelve year old woke up then tensed as he remembered how mad his big brother had been at him the night before.

And it had seemed like this morning wasn't going to be any better. His big brother wasn't stampeding through the motel room in a rush to get dressed like usual, no, he was being quiet, too quiet…

"Dean, what's wrong?" The twelve year old asked in a pleading voice.

And instead of answering the question the seventeen year old had replied "If you're not out in the car in the next ten minutes, you'll be walking to school."

The twelve year old knew that Dean wasn't bluffing and he knew that he had, had to have really screwed up if his big brother was pissed off at him enough to not make sure he got to school safely and on time, especially since the Mid-April weather had taken a turn towards the cold side and his big brother would have NORMALLY cared about the fact that Sam didn't have anything warm to wear and would have normally bitched a fit if Sam had even suggested walking to school in such frigidly cold weather, it was a miracle that Dean had allowed him to walk home from school the day before and it had been a decently bearable sixty-three degrees. Yeah. The twelve year old knew that he had to have done something major to have his big brother this pissed at him… But WHAT?... What had he done?... It couldn't be about him trying to get out of going to Plucky's so he could study and finish his homework… Could it?... He hadn't meant to make Dean mad, he had just needed to be able to concentrate on something that was important to him, his big brother had never gotten mad at their dad during all the times their dad had 'needed peace and quiet' to concentrate on something that was important to him, so how was this any different?

"Dean?.. Did I do something wrong?"

"You've got four minutes left."

Sam hastily threw on a pair of jeans and a hooded sweatshirt then slipped his already sock clad feet into his shoes and ran his fingers through his hair with one hand and grabbed his backpack with the other as he rushed for the door exclaiming "I'm ready!"

Once out in the car, Sam sprung on the chance to ask again "Did I do something wrong?"

"Everything you do is wrong!" The seventeen year old had bellowed.

"I'm sorry." The twelve year old had whispered tearfully.

The seventeen year old didn't reply and the rest of the drive was made in silence.

The seventeen year old Dean had peeled out of the middle school parking lot a mere fraction of a second after Sam had stepped out of the car, the younger boy had barely enough time to close his door after exiting the vehicle and had just narrowly missed having his foot run over by his own big brother's beloved car in the process.

The twelve year old was still upset from the words his brother had shouted at him and watching as Dean sped away after coming so close to actually causing him real harm (a broken foot is no joke, after all and a crushed one is even less of a laughing matter). The young boy was feeling like his whole world was collapsing in on itself. Without Dean, he didn't have anyone, he didn't have anything and life just wasn't worth living if he had to live it knowing that Dean no longer loved him.

The boy went through the first half of the day trapped in such a thick fog that when the bell rang for the hour long break for lunch, his fourth period teacher had, had to shake him from his stupor to get him to leave the already empty classroom and head for either the cafeteria or the big field where the middle-schoolers congregated during lunch break. The boy had been so out of focus he had no idea what he had done for the first four hours of Achievement Testing, or if he had even done anything at all. As far as he knew, those first four tests could be sitting on his teachers' desks, completely blank.

Sam hadn't felt hungry so he just shuffled out to the field where he leaned against the gym that had recently been built as an addition to the high school next door and where he was standing officially counted as 'high-schooler turf' despite the fact that the fence that divided the two different school grounds from each other was built off of the far corner of the gym leaving the whole backside of the gym open for any middle-schooler brave enough or suicidal enough to invade the space and lean against the back wall of the gym if they chose to do so.

The boy didn't care whose 'turf' it was, he didn't even care if someone confronted him, spoiling for a fight. In fact he hoped someone would want to fight, and he wouldn't fight back either, he'd just stand there till whoever knocked him down then he'd lay there and let whoever kick him, hopefully right in the head, over and over and over and over again until his brains were splattered against the back wall of the high-schoolers' precious gym.

And it looked like his luck would be super good on this day because a group of high school boys had spotted him and had climbed through the hole in the fence (And seriously, what was the point of a fence when there was a hole in the damn thing that everyone knew about and kept climbing through to terrorize the younger kids?!) and marching up to him with menacing looks on their faces.

"Who do you think you are little boy? Don't you know it's against the rules to be over here?" The tall, muscle bound leader of the group jeered.

"Yeah." The twelve year old had answered "I know it's against the rules and I don't really give a damn."

"Ooo, we got ourselves a little rebel on our hands here boys." The leader stated with a smirk "What's your name, kid?"

"Sam."

"Sam, I'm Gavin, this is Mason." Gavin pointed to his right at a short, stocky guy who was packed with muscle. "This is Ryan… Mark… And Shane." Gavin pointed to each boy in turn, Ryan who was tall and skinny, Mark who had an average height and build, and Shane who was shorter than Mason, but was skinny like Ryan. "We could use an extra guy for basketball. Wanna play a little three on three with us?"

Damn.. Of course the one time he was actually hoping for bullies and here was a perfect group of guys who could easily kill him and just as his luck would have it, they were being.. NICE! Talk about irony kicking him in the teeth when he was already down!

"Which side of the fence?"

"We could play inside the gym." Gavin replied.

It had to be some kind of a trick.

The gym was like the crown jewel for the high school kids.

There was no way that they were gonna invite some middle school twerp in to play a game of basketball.

But hey, if they were going to kill him for being "on their turf", at least he could die inside where it was warm.

"Sure." The twelve year old replied.

The inside of the gym was pristine. The basketball court was built to NBA standards because apparently there were a lot of high school kids at this place who had the potential to hit the big time and a lot of rich parents who had funded the building of the gym to make sure that their precious little babies got the best place to hone their skills.

It made the twelve year old sick, in a weird sort of way. This gym had everything, a professional style weight room, electronic scoreboards that had probably cost a few hundred thousand dollars and the innovatingly built locker rooms and shower rooms, that had probably been even more expensive, all in all the gym had, had to have cost over a million dollars to build. All while there were kids like him, whose families couldn't afford to get them warm clothes that fit, couldn't always afford to feed them, could hardly ever afford to get them the school supplies they needed. Kids just like him, all over this school district and the most important thing for the people of this town had been to build the high school a freaking million dollar, state-of-the-art gym?

Man, the wrong people got to be rich.

If the twelve year old had his say, the town would build a center for the underprivileged families, where people could get help with getting food, clothes and school supplies for their children, and there'd even be a sports center for everyone's use, not just high school kids.

But if the town wanted to spend a million dollars on a high school gym instead of spending a million dollars to actually help people in need and give all the children in this town a safe place to play sports, well, it was their money to waste, Sam knew that he had no say in the matter. He never had a say in any matter.

"Alright, Sam." Gavin's voice broke Sam from his thoughts. "You'll be on my team with me and Mark." Gavin stated as he grabbed a ball from one of the racks. "First team to thirty wins. Unless the bell rings, then whoever has the highest score wins."

Running back and forth across the gym, passing the ball and taking shots where he could, made the twelve year old feel… Clearer, freer, somehow. It was like the simplicity of the sport, or maybe the simplicity of the exercise was taking away all the stress and pressure that he had been feeling, like it was making him somehow just forget.. Everything except for how to breath and live in just these moments, in these fluid movements of running , he was putting his soul into the game, he was in so deep. For those moments everything was easy, everything bad, had just fallen away with the purification of doing something he loved. For those moments, everything felt better, life felt better. Or maybe it was just the adrenaline and endorphins, from all of the physical activity that he was getting that were making him feel so great.

By the time Gavin had scored the winning shot for their team, the twelve year old Sam, had felt like a changed kid, he felt like all his problems would just disappear if he could just keep playing.

"Hey, Sam." Gavin said, catching the twelve year old's attention. "You play a pretty good game of hoops, kid."

"Thanks." Sam had replied.

"Yeah, man, you have one hell of a layup." Ryan stated.

"Your three pointers weren't too shabby either." Mason added.

"Thanks guys."

"You know, we could meet at the same place tomorrow and play again if you want?" Gavin replied sounding hopeful.

"Uh…" The twelve year old was unsure. On one hand, playing basketball had made him feel better than he had in a long time, but on the other hand, his life was going to crap and he didn't see much of a point in having only a temporary reprieve, when what he really wanted was something permanent… But maybe,- The twelve year old felt a sliver of hope light up some of the darkness weighing on his heart- maybe things could change, for the better, maybe all he had to do was give things time and a chance to change?... "Yeah." Sam had replied. "That would be awesome."…

"Great." Gavin sounded happy as he said "And don't worry, if any of the high-schoolers get in your face for being near the gym, tomorrow when you're waiting for us, just tell them to bug off and leave you alone or your pal Gavin will kick their asses."

That made Sam huff out a quiet chuckle. And to think, Sam had been hoping for a bully and instead he had gotten someone who was like the way his big brother had USED to be towards him… It made the kid miss Dean even more, which was sad, because he lived with Dean, but not the same Dean he had always known.

"See ya tomorrow, Sam!" Gavin shouted as the bell rang and Sam headed for the doors at the side of the gym closest to the middle school..

"See ya tomorrow!" Sam replied with a wave as he ran out towards his school.

The twelve year old spent the rest of the day feeling a little clearer and more able to focus on getting his work done for the day, but when the final bell of the day rang… It was like the world was knocked off it's axis as he realized that he was about to be face to face with a big brother who was probably still pissed off at him.

The twelve year old didn't want to leave the safety of the school if it meant having to feel Dean's hatred and anger cutting into him like invisible knives. Suddenly the boy was just as depressed as he had been when he had arrived at school that morning.

He had felt like he was walking to the gallows as he walked out to meet his brother out by the Impala.

The seventeen year old just sat quiet and ridged in the driver's seat making it known without words that it would be unwise for Sam to try and talk to him, so the twelve year old slumped in his seat and quietly retreated to an imaginary world where he was loved by his family and there was no such things as monsters….

The twelve year old didn't even make a peep as his big brother drove him straight to Plucky's and issued the silent command that this was his post till he was told otherwise. Dean hadn't even given him any money this time around. But the twelve year old knew better than to say anything as grabbed his backpack and made his way into the 'kiddie-themed' restaurant that he was slowly beginning to hate with every fiber of his being. The twelve year old went without dinner that night and he felt weary every time someone's scrutinizing gaze landed on him. Like he was somehow doing something wrong just by sitting there trying to do his homework and study, because he couldn't afford to buy anything. And when his big brother came to get him the only way he had found out was the callous call where his brother told him "I'm out in the parking lot and leaving in five.", which five minutes was just barely enough time to fight his way through the crowd to get out of the restaurant let alone out to the parking lot, but somehow he had managed to make it in just over four and a half minutes, giving him just enough time to close his door before Dean peeled out of yet another parking lot.

The ride back to the hotel room had been quiet one boy angry and resentful and spoiling to kick someone's or something's ass and the other boy silent as he was engulfed by a tidal wave of depression and despair.

Once again, the twelve year old trudged into the room and went straight to bed without even trying to talk to his big brother, because he had known that with Dean that angry at him, it wouldn't do any good. He had learned a while back that it never did any good with his dad either.

Present day Dean watched as the scene grayed out again knowing that his past self's bad mood and foul temper was only going to escalate.

He remembered now, how over time, the memories of his crappy behavior and attitude from back then had slowly blurred, then eventually became something forgotten, something buried, probably because of shame and denial… And lots of liquor. He wondered if that had been what it was like for his dad… Had his dad gone on bender after bender, because he was always trying to forget what a bastard he was at times, which then in turn caused him to behave even worse? Dean could see how something like that could become a cycle…

Step One: 'Get drunk to forget all your problems.'

Step Two: 'Act like a bastard to your family and take your issues out on them because you're drunk, pissed and know you'll get away with treating them like crap.'

Step Three: 'When sober, realize what a bastard you were.'

Step Four: 'Get sober and stay sober and fix the devastation that your bad behavior, while you were drunk has caused.'

Step Five: 'Fail miserably at Step Four and go get drunk to forget how much of a bastard you were when you were drunk.'

Step Six: Repeat Steps One through Five over and over again in hopes that eventually at some point you'll actually manage to remain successful at Step Four all by yourself without ever seeking some sort of professional help.

Trying the same thing, over and over again, while hoping to achieve a different result. It was the very definition of insanity. Yet his dad had apparently adhered to a similar 'Six Step Program' or else he wouldn't have been the way he was towards Sam, always getting drunk and ripping away the kid's trust in him then getting sober and trying to fix what he had done and only confusing Sam and sending the boy mixed signals in the process.

When colors and sounds came back again, the twelve year old Sam noticed that his big brother was already gone as he climbed out of bed. The discovery that his brother had just left him had the boy feeling like he was being steadily worn down, ground down into dust and no one noticed, no one cared. Not really.

The boy stripped out of his clothes and slipped into the icy spray of the shower, he couldn't even care less about the fact that there was no hot water left, nor could he care less that he might be late for school. He couldn't really be brought to care much about anything. He didn't even know why he was still hanging on. He wanted to laugh at the small glimmer of hope, that making pseudo friends with older kids the previous day had given him. There was no point in that small glimmer of hope, not really. This place, the people in it, it was all temporary. Having friends who actually liked him for a month wasn't ever going to make up for having a family who would hate him for forever. It just wasn't possible to combat such thick and heavy darkness with such a small light that wasn't even ever going to last through being snuffed out in his family's next move… So, really.. What was the point?

He scrubbed and scrubbed and scrubbed until his skin was raw and even bleeding in some spots were his nails had dug in to his skin too deep, whispering to himself "Fat.", "Ugly.", "Failure.", "Everything I do is wrong.".. over and over again the entire time.

After slipping into a threadbare pair of jeans, a t-shirt, two thin flannel shirts and his socks and shoes, the twelve year old trudged out of the room and felt the cold instantaneously start seeping through his clothes as he locked up the hotel room.

The boy couldn't stop the shivers that wracked his body as he jogged the ten miles to school. But at least he had made it just in time to be in his seat as the first bell rang, despite how sluggish he was feeling. Whether that be from the cold or hunger from missing three meals, the twelve year old didn't know and he didn't care.

Once again he spent the day in a fog, not really caring about getting the answers in his Achievement Tests right, but for some odd reason he still kept catching himself putting at least some effort into it. He supposed that he was so used to getting the answers right that he couldn't really turn that small part of him off… Or there was some small part of him that was still striving for the light, desperately trying to grow out of the shadows of his despair.

When the bell for lunch finally rang the boy once again went straight outside, not even caring about eating.

He headed straight for the back of the high school gym to wait on Gavin, Mason, Ryan and Shane. He was leaning against the back wall when he heard a familiar voice coming from around the corner coming from close to the wall of the gym that was closest to the high school.

It was Dean and he was with a group of boys who looked like trouble, they were huddled together passing a Joint around.

The twelve year old leaned back against the back wall before Dean could look up and see him, he couldn't see Dean either, but he could hear him.

He was saying:

"Yeah, I know how ya feel, dude. I do everything I'm told and my dad never lets me do anything. I can't even hang out with friends unless it's at school. It's always "Watch your brother. Look out for Sammy. Someone has to take care of Sam." And I'm so freaking tired of always having to be stuck with the kid. He's twelve years old! He's old enough to take care of himself cause I damn sure was old enough to take care of both of us when I was his age! I wish for just once I could hang out with friends and actually have some kind of a life without that little brat always ruining everything."

Present day Dean felt his heart shatter right along with the twelve year old Sam's. The twelve year old Sam was devastated and Present day Dean knew that his seventeen year old self, had been the one to do that to him. He had done that. To the one person who he kept saying mattered the most to him. He had done that to Sam when he was just a little kid that was already going through such a huge emotional storm he had already been contemplating suicide several times ever since he was only eleven.

Present day Dean wanted to grab his seventeen year old self and haul him around the corner of that high school gym to show him what his words had just done to the now, trying to stay quiet, while sobbing incoherently, twelve year old Sam…

The twelve year old bolted from the back wall of the gym and ran for the middle school only to have Gavin suddenly show up calling "Hey, kid! Were those jerks giving you trouble?"

"No." The twelve year old whispered as he stopped, then turned to face Gavin "None of them even knew I was there." the boy cried. Then he turned back around with a "Sorry, I can't play basketball with you guys today. I have to go, I uh, have work that I needed to get done over lunch." The child lied as he stormed off back towards the middle school without even looking back, leaving a most likely confused Gavin in his wake.

Later that afternoon the twelve year old began to plan out all the details of his suicide as he made his way back to the hotel room. This time, he knew for sure where a loaded gun was kept and he was just going to keep things simple and quick… There wouldn't be any waiting around this time and then his big brother could be free, could be free of him and all the burdens that he caused for Dean.

But once again the boy's plans were thwarted as the sleeky black Impala screeched to a halt next to the sidewalk and the seventeen year old Dean looked over to him shouting "What the hell do you think you're doing? You know better than to just leave school on your own unless I tell you I can't give you a ride!"

"Oh, I'm so sorry." The twelve year old spat out sarcastically "I figured since you didn't care to stick around to let me know I'd be walking to school that you wouldn't give a flying crap if I walked home either!"

"You better watch your tone, Sam"

The twelve year old just shot a stubborn glare towards his older brother as he crossed his arms over his chest.

"Get in the car, I haven't got all day." The seventeen year old Dean stated in annoyance.

The younger boy slipped into the passenger seat without a word. He was hurting and he didn't want to make things worse by telling his big brother just how badly he was hurting, how badly he was hurting because of him.

When the Impala pulled into the parking lot of the Plucky's the twelve year old wasn't surprised, not even in the slightest. Because he got it now… He got why his big brother kept leaving him at these places. His big brother wanted to get rid of him, even for just a short amount of time so he could go out and have fun and hang out with his friends like a KID his age should get to do and the twelve year old wasn't going to stand in his big brother's way of having at least some kind of happiness. But when he watched the Impala pull away, for the first time ever he was afraid that this time, his big brother wouldn't come back for him.

Once again the twelve year old had been dropped off without any money so the boy sat in a corner booth closest to the entrance to watch through the window for when, if his brother came back. The boy sat stewing in his thoughts till he came to a decision about a few things.. He knew his big brother had friends in this town and that his big brother just wanted to get to be a regular teenager for once… So.. The twelve year old decided that when his dad told them it was time to pack up and move that he was going to fight it, with everything he had, he was going to fight to have his dad let them stay in this one town until at least the end of the school year so that his big brother could finally have a chance at being a regular teenager for at least a little while. Then maybe his big brother would stop hating him so much?

Of, course things didn't work out like that. When the seventeen year old got the both of them back to the hotel they found that their dad had come back from his hunt and was ready to pick up and move right then and though the twelve year old Sam had argued valiantly and had made an abundance of good points, the twelve year old had been no match for the "I'm your father and you will do as I say." line as it served to remind him that he was just a helpless, worthless kid who didn't get to have or deserve to have any kind of say in anything.

"He fought for me." Present day Dean whispered as the scene faded to black "Even after I treated him like crap, he had still fought for me the only way he knew how." And now Dean knew why he had remembered that place so easily and readily, it was because that had been where Sam had started turning everything into an argument, but it was also where he and Sam had really begun drifting apart. Looking back on those things now, he felt he only had himself to blame for pushing Sam away.

~0~

As Angie led him through the darkness once more, he could hear the whirring sound but it was faint and sounded weak spurring Dean, making him feel an urgency to go towards it, to keep it safe, to help it grow strong again.

"Soon, Dean. I promise." Angie stated as she tugged him away from following after the sound and along with her towards the next door.

This time the door they came to was Easter Lily Yellow that had a silver number twenty-three on it with a silver handled knocker below the number. Inside the room was decorated with yellow and bronze sun motifs everywhere. On a stationary pad he could see that the name of the hotel was called 'The Daylight Savings Inn.' and it was in Tampa, Florida...

Present day Dean took in the room, it was another dump, with water stains lining the bottom of all four walls from apparent flooding and he couldn't help but still be enraged by how pathetically blind he had been to just how many times his dad had made them live in hotel rooms for sometimes weeks at a time and how blind he had been to the fact that the places his dad had made them live in, had been complete dumps eight out of ten times. How could he have been so okay, with having allowed himself to be left to live in such poor conditions? How could he have been so okay, with allowing HIS Sammy, to be left to live in the sorts of heinous conditions he had seen?

When whoever he was viewing things from moved towards the bathroom and looked into the bathroom mirror Present day Dean could see that he was looking at things from the perspective of a teary eyed, twelve year old Sam… Just how many moves had the kid gone though at just twelve years old?

But… Why was the kid crying?... Shouldn't he have somehow seen what had caused the twelve year old Sam to cry?

"It's not like anyone else cares. So, why should I?" The twelve year old muttered to himself as he scrubbed the evidence that he had been crying off of his face.

"Why do I even care about anything?" The boy growled at his reflection, then he slammed a fist into the wall next to the mirror.

After a few harsh and angry breaths, the boy tentatively opened up his small hygiene kit that sat on the side of the sink and pulled out a razor blade.

Taking a deep breath the twelve year old used his free hand to unbutton and unzip his pants then he pulled his jeans and underwear down to his knees, thus exposing a vast array of thin, straight, neatly ordered scabbed over or freshly healing cuts that lined both of the child's lower hips.

The boy drew the blade across one hip, breathing out a hiss as he did so when blood automatically appeared in the razor's wake.

"One, for being so worthless that no matter what I do, how hard I try, no one is ever going to really love me." The boy stated through clenched teeth.

"And... Two." The boy ground out as he drew the edge of the razor across his other hip "For being stupid enough to even care about still trying."

Releasing a heavy, yet almost relieved sounding breath the boy looked at his left forearm and pushed the bloody edge of the razor against it hard enough just to feel the bite as he whispered "One day. One day, I'm gonna be brave enough. One day, I'm gonna work up to being able to finally cut here."

Then the child let out a saddened sigh as he let removed the edge of the razor from his flesh, wiped the razor down then put it back into his hygiene kit as he whispered "But today I'm still a worthless coward."

The boy had just finished staunching the blood flow from the self-inflicted cuts when he heard the door to the hotel room open so he hastily pulled his pants back up then flushed the toilet and washed his hands so it would appear that he had simply been in the bathroom only to use the toilet and nothing else.

"When?... When did?.." Present day Dean couldn't even bring himself to ask the question out loud.. But WHEN, had Sam started cutting himself? By the looks of some of the scars he had seen, Sam had seemingly been at it for a while… HOW had he missed that?.. And not just then, but NOW?.. Wasn't Angie supposed to be taking through all of Sam's important memories?.. Well, Angie may have a different opinion of what 'important' meant, but to Present day Dean it damn sure was important for him to know when and how something as bad as Sam cutting himself, as Sam hurting himself, had started and more importantly, when and how or IF it had stopped.

Angie gave him a sympathetic look as she asked "Do you finally understand? It hasn't even been a full month since the last memory you saw has taken place, yet, somehow, within such a short span of time your brother's past self, had already accumulated so many self-inflicted scars, all it took was the blink of an eye and already so much had been missed."

"I… Uh… I don't understand.." Present day Dean stammered.

"I brought us to this point of time in Sam's memories to help you understand, that even if the two of you hadn't been drifting away from each other back then, you still wouldn't have been able to have known that Sam had started cutting himself. I'm trying to help you understand, that Sam doing what he was doing, wasn't something you could have kept from happening, that what was going on with Sam back then wasn't your fault and isn't something you should feel the need to shoulder the blame for."

"So you're saying it was SAM'S fault?" Present day Dean roared "HE was just a kid! And he was hurting and no one was there for him! He was only dealing with all of it the only ways he could! HOW was it his fault?!"

Angie gave him a sad smile "Exactly... It wasn't Sam's fault either. He was a very depressed child who was not only going through the chaos of puberty but also the trials and traumas of a very dangerous and stressful life, that was riddled with severe and sometimes even degrading, mental, physical, emotional and spiritual pain that no one but a highly qualified professional who knew about the all too terrible reality of monsters, ghosts and demons, could have helped with."

Present day Dean gave a weary sigh "But, how did he get through all of this without the help he needed? How did he get through all of this with both me and dad only making things worse for him?"

"Dean, don't you see?" Angie whispered as she used her free hand to caress the side of Dean's face "You were also a very depressed CHILD who was not only going through the chaos of the final and most turbulent stages of puberty but also the same trials, traumas, stresses and pains that Sam had been going through. And you had also been dealing with all of it the only ways that you had known how."

"But Sam didn't deserve for me to deal with it by taking it all out on him!" Present day Dean roared.

"No, he didn't, but what you did back then wasn't your fault, Dean. You had no one to guide you.."

"Neither did SAM!" Dean bellowed.

"Yes, he did, he had you, Dean. For ten years you were his only stability, every good thing he's ever had or done in life are things he would not have had or achieved if he hadn't had the foundation that you single-handedly built for him to grow on…. Dean… You can ask any parent out there and they will tell you that it is so hard to raise a child. Then you ask a parent who is single and they will tell you of just how much more difficult doing it all on their own is… So when you think about the facts, that you had basically become a single parent at the tender age of four and that your father neglected you and gave you absolutely no stable example of how to be a parent, plus the fact that you were drug into a life where not only monsters, spirits and demons were real, but they posed a very real threat to both your life and the life of the child that you were trying to raise, every single day…. Well… When you add all those odds that were stacked against you to the mix of trying to be a single parent, it's remarkable that you managed to raise Sam into a fully capable man. Especially considering that you were also having to raise yourself at the same time … And you had to do it without the same sort of stable guidance that you had been providing for Sam. You did it without anyone helping you grow into the fully capable man that you still somehow managed to become despite everything."

"You're wrong, Angie, I did have someone to guide me. If it hadn't been for Sam, I wouldn't have cared so much, I wouldn't have tried so hard to set good examples or to even be a good person… If it hadn't been for Sam, I wouldn't have grown into the person I am today… So you see… I may have raised Sam, but he raised me too. I just wish that I had seen all this back then. Maybe then I would have appreciated him more. Given him more respect. Maybe I could have been there for him and helped him when he needed me the most, instead of constantly being a jackass that kept hurting him so much."

"You were doing the best you could with what you had to work with Dean, and considering how very small the amount of good things that you had to work with were and just how much of an abundance of bad things that were at a constant play in your life from a very young age. I'd say that both you and Sam persevered over insurmountable odds and that the only way you both were able to do that, was because you had each other."

"But look at him." Present day Dean whispered as he gestured to the last glimpse of the twelve year old Sam's reflection before the child exited the bathroom. "It doesn't look like he had anyone back then, to me."

"I know that's what it seems like, Dean. That it seems like even he believed that he had absolutely no one. But trust me, those emotions were only what were right on the surface at the time… Somewhere, deep down, he has never once truly believed that he didn't have someone. Because if he had, he wouldn't have been able to hold on for so long. I know you don't believe that you were there for him when he needed you, and with even more horrific memories still to come, that feeling may become intensified. But if there had ever been a point where he believed that he didn't somehow still have your love then he truly would have forsaken everything and given up. YOU are the reason that he's held on so long. The faith that he's always carried deep inside of his heart, the faith he had in knowing that you love him, is what kept him going."

"Love?.. Lot of good I did showing him that I love him." Dean scoffed "You saw how I treated him, you heard the things I said… Tell me, how was that giving him faith in my love for him?"

"I'm not saying that on the surface there weren't times when Sam didn't feel loved. But what I am saying is that no matter how Sam had felt on the surface, that didn't change the fact that somewhere, deep down in his very core, in a place where even Sam wasn't always aware of it, he somehow instinctively knew that you wouldn't ever really stop loving him. And that's what gave him the strength he needed to get past all of the things you have seen as well as all of the things you will see."

"Believe it or not, that actually makes me feel worse."

Angie gave him a confused look and Dean gave a heartbroken sigh as he elaborated "Because, everything I said and did, all the ways I hurt him… All the things that I didn't do to help that faith he had in me grow to where he could feel it not just deep down on some instinctual level, but on the surface and all around him as well…" Dean gave an annoyed huff "Don't you see?... I shouldn't have made him have to go on faith alone. I should have been there proving to him, every single step of the way that what he had faith in was real. That my love for him IS REAL!.."

"And his instinctual knowledge of that is what faith is, Dean."

"But what if he had been wrong?!... Then he would have had faith in me for nothing! His instincts would have been based on something that wasn't real! He would have been trusting in a love that wasn't even there!"

"But he wasn't wrong though, was he?"

"No!... Of course he wasn't wrong! But he didn't actually know that! And I didn't exactly give him anything to really let him know that he was right!"

"Again, Dean… That is the very definition of what faith is… He had faith in your love for him. He still has faith in your love for him."

"But HOW?!... WHY does he have faith in my love for him, when I've hardly been giving him anything to really have faith in?!"

"The answers to those questions are going to have to wait, Dean."

"WHAT?!"

"You're just going to have to trust me and know that when you get your answers, you will finally understand."

"I honestly don't think there's a way that I'll ever understand any of this. But you're right, the answers can wait, what's important right now is that I find out everything I need to know about my brother and I need to know when he started hurting himself, why he started hurting himself. I want to go back to what caused him to make the first cut, I need to see what happened to him."

Angie gave him a nod "Okay, we'll go back to the reason he started cutting." and the second she agreed the scene immediately went black and when the darkness receded there was a small field and Present day Dean could see his father standing tall above him as if he were lying flat on his back.

"You have to be ready for anything, Sam." The child's father commanded sternly "Did you see how easy it was for me to get a kick in at your midsection?"

"Only because I don't know how to counter moves like that and no matter how hard I try to block it, you always know how to get through!" The boy stated angrily as he stood back up and dusted himself off. He knew his dad had only had a few beers, so the man was sober enough to not have to worry about the 'monster' that would make an appearance if his dad ended up getting a chance to finish of the rest of the case… The boy knew it was in his own best interest to keep his dad actually focused on the sparring lesson.

"Are you back talking me?"

But maybe he should keep his temper in check, just to be on the safe side?

"No… I'm just saying… How do I defend myself against something that I can't block and that I don't know how to counter?" The boy stated, trying to sound as respectful as possible.

"Well, first it would be a whole lot easier for you to counter the kick if you weren't so fat.."

"No, it would be easier to counter the kick if you'd actually TEACH me HOW to counter it!" The boy shouted. There was no way he'd be able to reign in his anger if his dad kept goading him like that!

For all of two seconds the boy's father looked taken aback but then he regained his composure as he sternly replied "You better watch your attitude towards me, boy."

"Yes, Sir… Would… Would you… Please show me how to counter it?" The child tried for sounding respectful again… It was difficult to try and behave subservient towards his dad, because in his mind, he was supposed to be this man's CHILD, not his 'robotic toy soldier' that was programmed to follow his every order. But he knew that the 'robot' the 'toy soldier' was exactly what his dad wanted from him and it was saddening that the boy wanted to be that for his dad if it would mean that his dad wouldn't be disappointed in him for a change… But no matter how hard he tried to fit into that mold, the child just wasn't made that way.

"Get back in your stance."

The boy did as his father ordered.

"Now when I go for the kick, you go for the block only this time when you go to block you get ahold of my ankle, then you bring your outside leg out and sweep my other leg out from under me."

The twelve year old's father went for the kick and the boy managed to get the first two steps right, but when he went for the third step, instead of being successful at sweeping his father's leg as instructed, his dad did a heel kick to his knee with his free leg, causing them both to go to the ground where his dad put him in a leg lock.

"See, if you weren't so fat, you could have reacted faster…"

"I didn't know you were going to counter the move during my first try! How am I supposed to learn the move, if you won't, let me have a chance, to actually do it?!"

"You can't expect a monster to stand there and just let you sweep it's legs out from under it."

"I get that, dad, but you can't expect me to know how to do or counter moves that you haven't even taught me how to do or counter."

"I've been teaching you how to do this stuff for over a year now, Sam!... It's not that I haven't been teaching you, it's that you can't learn anything!"

"Teaching me this stuff for over a year?!" The twelve year old asked as his voice climbed higher "You haven't even been around for more than three days at a time!..."

The twelve year old was cut off mid-sentence when the his father's left hand grabbed the front of his shirt hauled him off of the ground, shook him, then literally threw him back down to the ground, where the child landed in an ungraceful heap.

The boy looked up at his father with a glare and waited for his dad to make the next move as he mentally chastised himself for antagonizing his dad even though he knew his dad wasn't that drunk, he still knew that he shouldn't have tempted fate like he had. Especially since his dad ws starting to be horribly mean to him even when he was sober…

"Get in the truck. We're done for the day." The child's father commanded with a harsh growl.

When the big black beast of a truck pulled into the hotel parking lot the twelve year old boy made a hasty beeline for the room where he threw himself into the bed and pulled the blankets over himself where he could pretend he had the luxury of crying in private.

"You need to get up and do your chores instead of laying around being lazy and crying like a baby all day."

He couldn't even have a moment of peace to just cry… Not while his dad was home the child was beginning to think the man was a complete bastard, whether he was drunk or not… Present day Dean knew for a fact that the man was a complete bastard, because if he hadn't have been then Sam would have never had anything to be constantly afraid of when he was still only just a child… "Yes, Sir." The twelve year old muttered with an aborted sob as he climbed back out of bed.

His father looked at him with disgust and anger filling his eyes "Go get cleaned up while I figure out something for you to do so you can maybe make yourself useful for a change." the man told his son with a sneer.

"Yes, Sir." Past Sam replied as he rushed to the bathroom before his dad could see the new tears forming in his eyes.

Once in the bathroom the boy stripped off his clothes and examined his naked form in the mirror and pinched at the baby fat around his stomach, legs, arms and face while muttering and hissing "FFFFFAAAAATTTTT."… "FFFAAATTT."… "Stupid, ugly, FAT." As he pinched each area "Fat little family freak." He growled at himself in the mirror as he pinched the fatty areas under his jawline. Then the boy bit his knuckles on his right hand and tried so desperately to swallow his slowly building rage. But nothing was working.

The boy was so distracted by his anger and self-loathing that when he shifted he accidently knocked his dad's hygiene kit off of the bathroom sink where it partially spilled into the floor, revealing something the boy revered as his salvation. The twelve year old hastily cleaned up the mess and put it all back in the kit, except for one item…

With one hand the boy put the hygiene kit back on the edge of the bathroom sing and with the other he used his thumb to ghost across the edge of a lose razor blade only pressing hard enough to feel the bite, not enough to break the skin.

He took a few seconds to stare in transfixed awe at the treasure he held in his hand and felt exhilarated just thinking of all the ways the precious little piece of metal could make everything better.

But he knew he had already been in the bathroom about five minutes and that if he were in there much longer his dad would come banging on the door demanding him to hurry. So for now he tucked the blade into his own hygiene kit knowing that his dad would never miss it because of how much he lost little things like razors with all the traveling he did. Once the razor was safely tucked away into his own little hiding place, the boy hurried through scrubbing himself down then redressed in some jeans and a t-shirt before exiting the bathroom.

The boy's father gave him an expectant look as he said "You can start off by cleaning all the trash out of the cab of my truck."

"Yes, Sir."

"And then you can clean all the trash out of the pickup bed."

"Yes, Sir." The boy replied again as he grabbed a trash bag and headed outside where he was glad that at the very least he didn't have to be stuck inside the room with his dad. Or worse outside cleaning out the truck while his dad loomed over him and criticized everything he did and how he did it.

No, thank you, he'd rather do without anymore of his dad's verbal badgering for the rest of the day.

Past Sam set to work and quickly lost himself in his task, he never did mind cleaning, it was freeing in a weird so of way. A good, healthy, constructive, distraction from everything he had been going through.

But of course, that distraction could only last so long. The twelve year old had only been outside cleaning for ten minutes and was actually very close to finished with cleaning all of the trash out of both the front and the back of the truck, when his dad yanked open the hotel room door and snarled threateningly at the boy to get back inside and once he was back in the room he found himself facing his father who was even more drunk than he had been only ten minutes ago… The child's father grabbed him by the collar again and gave him an angry shake as he began to rant about how cleaning out the truck should have been only a five minute task then the man proceeded to tell the boy that he was slow, lazy and good for nothing. That he was 'worthless' and couldn't do anything right.

The boy struggled not to cry under the onslaught of his father's drunken words and actions, but there was only so many times the child could withstand being manhandled in such a hateful way without crying and the twelve year old couldn't fight the deluge of tears that began cascading down his cheeks making his father give a disgusted snort as he released the twelve year old and let him drop to the ground. "There's research that needs done. I want the books on the table gone through and I want you to have all the information on a Manananggal by the time I get back from where I'm going."

The boy looked up at his father and was poised to argue when his father looked at his watch and said "You only have about three hours to get it done, so you'd better get a move on."

"But that's nowhere near enough time to do the research properly especially if it's for an actual hunt!" The twelve year old protested.

"Figure out a way to make it enough time or you'll suffer the consequences." The child's father replied with a drunken air of indifference. "I'm going out to the County Sheriff's Department six towns over to see if I can get a look at the body of this thing's latest vic, you'd better hope you have that research done by the time I get back, because you really don't want to know what will happen if you don't."

"Yes, Sir." The twelve year old replied as he rushed over towards the table and started flipping all of the books laying on it open trying to find the information that he knew he would desperately need if he didn't want to suffer his father's wrath later.

An hour passed, changing the sky from a subdued baby blue, to a slowly darkening indigo dotted with the first few stars of the evening and the boy was already well immersed into the research on a Manananggal, which as it turned out is a very nasty, man-eating creature that can only be killed one way.

Seeing how dangerous the creature could be and how difficult it might be to kill, spurred the twelve year old to search out every single speck of information on a Manananggal that the he could from just the books his father had left him to research from. The child had just read an extremely gruesome passage about how a Manananggal's main preference for getting food is by drinking blood straight from the hearts of unborn children, when he heard the purr of the Impala's engine coming to an idle right outside the hotel room.

A shadow moved across the window next to the table then the door to the room opened and a moody seventeen year old Dean had barely entered when he ordered Sam to get in the car.

"But dad said he wanted me to do research…" The twelve year old protested weakly.

"Who do you think told me to come get you, Santa Claus?"

"But what about the research he wanted me to do?"

"I don't know and I don't care." The seventeen year old snapped "Now get in the car, Sam!"

Feeling it was better to be safe rather than sorry, the child emptied his duffle out onto his bed and gathered up the books as well as all of the research he had written down and stuffed it all into the duffle, then ran to the Impala before he made his big brother even more pissed with him.

The twelve year old watched as his big brother made sure the hotel room was locked up, then the seventeen year old was slamming his door shut and gunning the Impala out of the parking lot and down the road like a bat out of hell.

"Dean, what's going on?" The twelve year old asked.

"Dad ran into the Manananggal…"

"He, WHAT?!"

"Stop freaking out, it's already dead, he just needs us to stand watch while he torches the corpse."

"How'd he kill it?"

"What?... Why?" The seventeen year old asked.

The twelve year old didn't answer because he was too busy using his cell phone to speed dial his dad's number.

"What?!" His father's voice growled from the other end of the line.

"Dad, listen to me, she's not dead yet."

"She?... I cut off it's head."

"I'm telling you, she's not dead!"

"I took of it's head, nothing can survive that!"

"Dad, the only way to kill one of these things is if…. Dad?... Dad?... Son of a bitch, he hung up on me!"

"It's not like you were saying anything worth actually listening to."

"Worth listening to?" The twelve year old asked incredulously "I was trying to tell him the only way to kill this thing!"

When the Impala pulled up to the coordinates their father had given the seventeen year old Dean the brothers found their father laying on the ground unconscious with a gash on his head and a bite mark on his left forearm and with no Manananggal in sight.

"DAD!" The boys shouted in unison as they rushed to their father's side.

"Dad?!" The seventeen year old sounded frantic "Can you hear me?" he asked as his father started regaining consciousness.

"The bitch …. She wasn't dead." Their father groaned as he struggled to sit up "DAMN IT, now she's loose again!"

"She got away?" The seventeen year old asked as his eyes widened in horror then he began to scan the surrounding forest for just in case the bitch wanted to ambush them from the trees.

"Of course she got away!" The man snapped making both of his sons flinch then the eldest Winchester turned his sights on his youngest son "She got away because I didn't have the proper intel!... Boy.." He growled at the twelve year old Sam "Didn't I tell you to have all the research on that bitch done by now!"

"I… I… I tried to tell you that there's only one way to kill her!" The twelve year old stated frantically as he rushed to move backwards out of his father's immediate reach.

"Well, you didn't do it fast enough!" The man roared. Apparently he didn't give a crap that he had given Sam three hours then went and cut that time in half without any sort of warning, then refused to listen to what Sam had managed to find out despite being rushed…. Because, apparently the man wasn't going to shoulder any of the blame… No, he had a twelve year old son that was perfect for heaping all of the blame on.

"You're the one who hung up on ME!" The twelve year old shrieked in near hysterics as his father came to a stand.

"Don't you talk back to me like that!" the man growled and took a threatening step towards the twelve year old.

"Stop it, both of you!" The seventeen year old shouted, throwing both his father and younger brother for a loop. "That thing could still be out here somewhere!"

"Right." Their father replied in apparent confusion, then he gave a cough that sounded ... Embarrassed?.. Ashamed?... Apologetic?... All of the above?... as he gave Sam and Dean orders to start searching the Southern part of the forest while he took the Northern part of the forest.

"Why do you always have to piss dad off so much?" The seventeen year old whispered angrily at his brother as soon as they were out of their dad's earshot "Why can't you just listen to him and do what he says without arguing with him for a change?"

"What?!" The twelve year old whispered back sounding just as angry "You were in the car! You know he's the one who hung up on me before I could even tell him there's only one way to kill…. Dean, look out!"

The seventeen year old side-stepped just in time to avoid being tackled by a bat winged woman's upper half…

"We have to find her legs!" The twelve year old shouted as the hideous creature's upper half flew up and around trying to poise itself for a second lunge "Pouring salt and holy water over its lower half is the only way to kill it!"

"Got it! You go that way, I'll go this way."

"No! We stick together!" The twelve year old shouted as he followed his big brother despite what he had been ordered to do.

"Sam, go back! We need to split up to find the other half of that bitch!"

"No! Her upper half came from this way, I'm going with you!"

The seventeen year old gave his kid brother a violent shove "This… Right here… This is the problem I was talking about!" The older boy hissed "You can't even follow one simple order without arguing and it's gonna end up getting someone killed!"

That caused the twelve year old to freeze in his tracks as he heard his father's voice in his head saying "You're gonna be the reason Dean dies."

"No!" The twelve year old shouted and lunged at his big brother knocking him to the ground just as the hideous upper half of the Manananggal swooped in at another attempt to tackle the seventeen year old, causing the ugly hag to miss Dean, but not the twelve year old Sam. Who was now trapped in her clutches as he took him high above the ground…

The twelve year old looked down and realized that he was at least twenty feet from the ground and not caring about his own life, the boy began to headbut the evil, man eating witch until she lost her grip on him, causing him to fall to the ground below…

Everything went gray….

"SAM!" Present day Dean bellowed as he tried to charge forward only to have Angie hold him back.

It didn't take long before everything flooded back into focus.

The twelve year old Sam groaned and opened his eyes. He was somewhere on the forest floor and somehow still alive, which the boy considered the most unfortunate thing to have ever happened to him. He was hoping to have died while trying to save his brother's life, because then his own life could finally mean something… But no… He was alive and in a severe amount of pain… Pain that seemed to be radiating from EVERYWHERE.. But most especially his back, head and ribs.. And when he thought too much about it, his left arm and his left ankle really hurt as well.

The boy had just finished assessing all of his injuries when he heard a rustling sound… The twelve year old struggled to a stand in preparation to be grabbed up by the wicked hag again when out of the woods stumbled a torsoless lower half… In any other situation seeing a disembodied set of legs stumbling around on their own would be comical… But not in this situation…. In this situation it was crucial to saturate that disembodied lower half with as much salt and holy water as possible.

Except… There were a few problems with that… The twelve year old didn't have any salt or holy water on him because he had left his bag back in the car while in his panicked rush to get to his unconscious father.

"DAMN IT!" The twelve year old groaned in outrage…. Well… It was just the bitch's lower half, he could just carry it over to his big brother… That should be easy enough…. Right?...

Wrong…

As the twelve year old trudged through the woods towards where he instinctually knew his big brother would be, the legs kept kicking him and trying to stomp on his injured ankle, which was slowing the boy down and also somehow funny as hell… Or maybe that was the bleeding head wound making the child laugh uncontrollably as he carried the Manananggal's lower half through the forest.

"Dean!" The twelve year old shouted as his brother's form became visible through the trees. Turned out his big brother had also been heading straight towards him as well.

"What the hell was that, Sam?" His big brother growled.

"Look, I found her lower half." The twelve year old's voice was high pitched and giddy "But I didn't have salt or holy water to kill her with."

That momentarily distracted the older boy from his anger "Yeah… Here… I got it." the seventeen year old replied as he pulled out two flasks, one filled with holy water, the other filled with salt.

"You gotta really soak it down… It's gotta be covered." The twelve year old stated sounding a bit punch drunk.

The seventeen year old only nodded then proceeded to empty both flasks over the lower half, then the upper half swooped in and gave an angry, ear piercing screech.

"What now?! She's still not dead!" The seventeen year old shouted as he dodged out of the reach of the flying bitch's talons.

"The sun.." The twelve year old was definitely punch drunk and most likely had a concussion. "Gotta wait till the sun rises… If she can't re… re… if she can't put herself back together before the sun comes up she'll die. And the salt and the holy water makes it to where she can't re… re… re… attach herself to her lower… her lower… her legs." the child stammered, feeling suddenly very nauseous as he lowered himself down to take a knee.

"Sam?" The seventeen year old Dean sounded worried but that didn't register with the younger boy. Just then the vicious hag tried to swoop in again only to be shot out of the sky by the father of the boys she was trying to attack.

The evil, man eating witch's lifeless body fell to the ground.

"She's still not dead." The twelve year old's speech was beginning to slur. "She won't die till sun… till sun…"

"She can't die till sunrise when she tries and fails to reattach herself to her lower half." The seventeen year old Dean completed his kid brother's sentence for him seeing as how the boy was having a bit of trouble with speaking.

"Yeah, that." Came the twelve year old's relieved reply.

"What's wrong with him." Their father asked as if he was just now noticing that something was indeed wrong with his youngest child.

"Bitch got a hold of him then dropped him from about twenty feet up." The seventeen year old stated through clenched teeth.

"Anything broken?" Their father asked sounding actually concerned for once.

The twelve year old gave a delirious scoff and asked "Does it matter?" making that 'guilty' and 'ashamed' look cross his father's face.

"Get him to the hotel and get him patched up, I'll make sure the bitch stays dead for good even if I have to keep putting bullets through her skull till sunrise."

"Who's gonna stand watch while you torch her corpse?" The seventeen year old asked.

"She…She'll" The twelve year old stammered "When the sun… She… She'll burn when the sun… She'll… Poof… Catch fire."

"She'll burst into flames when the sun rises?" The seventeen year old asked as he helped the twelve year old to his feet.

"Yeah, that." The twelve year old answered with a weak nod " That's what'll happen… It's… It's… It's where lot. of.f.f.f vampire mythsss…"

"Yeah… We get it, kiddo." The child's father stated sounding almost fond of his youngest child. "Go ahead and get him out of here, Dean, he needs that head wound looked at."

"Yes, Sir." The seventeen year old replied as he helped his kid brother limp towards the direction of where the Impala was parked.

Once they were out of their father's earshot the seventeen year old gave a disgruntled huff and asked "So, where all does it hurt?"

"Mmmm… Back, ribs, head…. Mmm..mm..mmy arm and my ankle." The twelve year old's consciousness was beginning to ebb away.

"That's what you get for doing something so stupid!" The older brother growled angrily "I mean what the hell was that back there?"

"I… I… Sh…sh…she wasss.s. … and… I… I.."

"Just stop trying to talk, you sound like a scratched record." The seventeen year old snapped, sounding frustrated and annoyed "Just, don't be stupid enough to do anything like that ever again."

"Wasn't stupid… Kept you safe." The younger boy slurred then the scene went gray right as the Impala had come into view.

Present day Dean swallowed thickly at hearing the sincerity of the twelve year old Sam's words "Wasn't stupid… Kept you safe." like that and that alone was all that had mattered to the kid.

When sounds and colors slowly flowed back into the scene the twelve year old gave a few blinks to help ground himself before he started to sit up only to find himself being pushed back down onto a nest of pillows.

"Whaa?" The boy asked blearily and obviously confused as he struggled to focus.

"You got a pretty gnarly concussion and a nice set of bruised ribs to go with it." The seventeen year old Dean replied. "You need to stay in bed."

"Kay." The twelve year old stated groggily "But… I… Uh… Bathroom." the boy was still having trouble with his speech, but it wasn't as bad as it had been and he wasn't feeling so knocked off kilter, so that was a plus.

"Oh…" The seventeen year old replied sounding amused "Yeah… I can see how you'd need to get out of bed for that. Here, let me help you."

The seventeen year old helped take most of his kid brother's weight so the boy didn't put any weight on his left ankle. At the confused look on the twelve year old's face the big brother replied "You also have a sprained ankle and wrist on your left side to complete the whole ensemble."

"I don't even feel too much pain." The twelve year old stated blearily.

"Yeah, I managed to get you to take some pain killers earlier even though you were still pretty out of it."

"Thanks for taking care of me." The twelve year old replied, the child's speech was more coherent now that he had been awake for a few minutes and he sounded genuinely grateful as his big brother helped him into the bathroom. "But do ya think that ya could?..." the boy gestured towards the door "Ya know?.." then he made a slight shooing motion with his hand that made the older brother huff out a chuckle.

"Yeah… I… Uh… I'll be right on the other side of the door, just call me when you're ready for me to help you back to bed."

"Got it."

"And no putting any weight on that ankle." The older brother commanded sternly.

"I won't." The twelve year old replied as he watched his big brother slip out of the bathroom and shut the door to give him some privacy then he eased his pajama pants down far enough to be able to relieve his bladder.

He had only just started to wash his hands when he heard his big brother asking "You still okay in there."

"Nah, I accidently flushed myself down the toilet." The younger boy's answer made the older brother huff out a laugh.

"If only I could be so lucky." The older brother replied jokingly as his kid brother opened up the door an allowed the seventeen year old to help him the rest of the way back to the bed.

"Has dad been back yet?" The twelve year old asked as he climbed back into his nest of pillows.

"Yeah, he went to get breakfast, he should be back in about thirty minutes."

"And the Manananggal?"

"Dead for good this time." The seventeen year old replied. "Now try to get some more sleep. I'll wake you when dad gets back with breakfast."

"Mmmm…. Kay" The younger boy agreed with a yawn as he let his eyes drift shut, making the scene go gray.

When colors and sound ebbed back into the scene, the twelve year old opened his eyes and saw his dad sitting at the small table looking over some books and lose pieces of paper.

"Hey." The child's father said as he noticed that the twelve year old Sam was awake.

"Hey." The twelve year old replied. "Where's Dean?'

"I sent him to the Post Office to pick up our new credit cards… I picked you up some breakfast." The boy's dad passed him a Styrofoam container and when the twelve year old opened the container he felt insulted as he found barely even four bites of oatmeal and half an orange…. "So you're cutting my diet down again?" the child asked with barely concealed frustration and anger.

"Well.." The eldest Winchester stated "That hag did get the drop on you…"

"Yeah, but that could have happened to anyone!" The twelve year old protested.

"If you had weighed less, you would have been able to move faster and then she wouldn't have been able to get her talons into you."

The twelve year old could only gape at his father in disbelief for a few seconds before he snapped out of it and said "My weight had nothing to do with it!"

"Says the boy who can't even see his toes because his stomach's always in the way.." His father replied with a drunken scoff… The twelve year old Sam could smell the bourbon on his dad's breath then he looked over towards the table and sure enough, two empty bottles littered the floor under the table and a half empty bottle rested atop the table. His dad was definitely skunked. Although the boy wouldn't put it past his dad to say hurtful things like that even if he had been stone cold sober at the moment.

The boy didn't respond, he refused to rise to the bait, instead, the twelve year old managed to hold his tears back until his dad stumbled drunkenly from the room, then he closed the Styrofoam container and tossed it into the bedside trashcan without even taking a single bite of the food inside… He wouldn't want to gain any more weight, after all…

Then the child rolled over and cried in silence until everything faded to gray…

When images and sounds began to filter into the child's consciousness again the twelve year old was aware of three things… One… It was already five thirty-five, Monday morning, according to the blaring alarm clock next to his bed … Two… That his dad was gone… Again… Probably off to another hunt… And… Three… That his big brother seemed pissed at him again.

The child tried to take it all in stride as he hobbled towards the bathroom to get ready for school.

It never occurred to the twelve year old just how unhealthy it might be to go ahead and go to school after having only a total of four hours sleep and absolutely nothing to eat in twenty-four hours, after going through that same twenty-four hour hours with severe trauma to the head… And wasn't it just that it really wasn't different than any other day? That a twelve year old child was actually used to going to school sporting all sorts of injuries from all of the various hunts he had been on?

Present day Dean was cursing himself because back then he knew he had known better than to let someone with a concussion sleep without being woken up every hour and he damn sure knew that his dad would have definitely known better… Yet both he and his dad had let Sam sleep through almost an entire day, only waking the child up twice in a whole twenty-four hour time period… It's a wonder that the twelve year old had woken up the next day at all.

The twelve year old Sam ignored the extreme headache, nausea and dizziness, that had all begun to manifest right before he had drifted off to sleep the previous day, as he finished getting dressed, locked up the hotel room and slid into the passenger seat of the Impala, next to the very sullen seventeen year old Dean. All of the repairs the boys had only just begun to make to mend the gap between them had all been undone by their father's departure and now the rift between the young brothers was even wider now than it had been as the older brother blamed his younger brother for their father leaving and the younger brother believed everything was always his fault so he wouldn't be attempting to change his big brother's view of things anytime soon.

The twelve year old spent the day at school trying to ignore the insults of 'Tubby' and 'Fatty' and all of the other, very uncreative and immature names the other kids in school called him, it didn't escape the child's notice that the children in his newest school honed in on one of the main things that he was most insecure about. Maybe if he started carrying an air that stated he felt confident and secure in his own skin despite his weight, then maybe the other kids would leave him alone?... But… Who was he kidding?... All he saw when he looked in the mirror was a 'BIG FAT LOSER!', a 'failure', a 'disappointment'… How was he ever going to give off an air of confidence if he never really felt confident?

Around the middle of his seventh hour class, the headache that had been churning just under the area where he had hit his head, had brewed into something so debilitating that the boy could hardly see straight and his stomach felt like it had been thrown into a dryer set on "tumble"… He was definitely going to be sick.

It took practically begging for a hall pass before his teacher gave in and allowed him to go to the bathroom, although the boy was certain that him visibly turning an interesting shade of green, may have had something to do with his teacher making haste in writing out and handing over the hall pass that he was now tightly clinging to as he rode out the excruciating stabs of pain and emptied the nonexistent contents of his rolling stomach into one of the middle school's many toilets. And when the bell rang, announcing that it was time to head to his fourth hour class, the boy realized that he wasn't going to be leaving the bathroom anytime soon. He felt a wave of dizziness crashing into him and there was a darkness creeping into the edges of his vision.

When the darkness receded Present day Dean realized that the twelve year old Sam had somehow made it from the middle school bathroom all the way to the hotel room without even Sam having known how he had gotten there… Which meant that the concussion that Sam had been sporting must have been more severe than even he or their dad had realized… There Sam was in possibly serious need of actual medical care and the child's family had failed him.

The twelve year old was standing in the bathroom staring at his naked body, drawing a line across his hip and watching with a pleased fascination as a steady trickle of blood formed in the razor's wake. That first cut, almost felt like happiness. But then he remembered that he was fat and a failure and that he didn't deserve to feel happy and the second cut, drawn across his right hip, was strictly for punishment for having even dared to want to be happy.

After two more, nice, even cuts, that were each beautiful and sickeningly satisfying in their own rights, the boy pulled his clothes back on to hide his shameful and dirty little secret then he climbed into bed, next to where he had dropped his backpack, and promptly passed out… Only to find himself being woken up by his big brother shouting for him to get a move on less than forty-five minutes later.

"Wha?.." The twelve year old asked blearily as he fought to lift his head.

"I said get up and get your crap together, I've got stuff I gotta do tonight so I'm dropping you off at Plucky's."

"I can't… My head." The younger brother groaned as he tried to convey how bad he was feeling.

"Suck it up princess, your precious little head's had plenty of time to heal." The seventeen year old stated sounding like he really couldn't care less. Present day Dean knew that his past self was just trying to keep it together or else he'd lose it… Because their dad had left them without any money or working credit cards, again, which meant that he would be, having to sell himself for money, again, or else he and his younger brother would be without a roof over their heads by the end of the week. And while the seventeen year old Dean may have had a very healthy libido and a genuine love for giving and receiving pleasure during sex, he did not like having to sell himself, because it somehow felt obligatory, while having sex for fun and pleasure, was just that, for fun and pleasure. It was a way of meeting HIS needs, and when he sold himself he was giving himself over to someone else's needs for money with no real regard to his own desires and that was the problem.. He gave himself over to almost everyone else's needs damn near twenty-four seven and sex had been the one thing that he could have that was just for him, for HIS pleasure, HIS needs- except for when he sold himself, which he only did to help the nearly destitute monetary needs of his vagabond family… Maybe that was the real reason he had hated having to do it?

The twelve year old grabbed his backpack from beside him, then struggled to push himself out of bed and into some sort of forward momentum that was aimed towards the hotel room door, but he eventually made it outside and into the passenger seat of the Impala.

The child didn't voice any objections as his big brother once again sped away and left him standing in the parking lot of a Plucky Penniwhistle's Magical Menagerie without any money to use for something to eat… The twelve year old just figured that his big brother was tired of seeing what a little tub of lard the family freak had become and had must have finally decided that the freak didn't need to eat. Present day Dean was kicking himself a he listened to the twelve year Sam's ever darkening thoughts about his body, because the boy wasn't overweight… Present day Dean knew that the steroids that the child's father had given him over a year prior had probably caused the first initial 'puffy' look, making it appear as if Sam had gained weight and once the puffiness had gone down the boy had looked perfectly fine, but the child's ignorant jackass of a father had mistaken the still left over 'baby fat' as 'overweight fat' and thus set about torturing the poor boy, tanking his self-esteem and causing him to slide deeper into depression over his supposed 'weight gain' when in reality the child's body had stored all of those last little bits of baby fat because it had needed that extra bit of fuel reserve so that Sam's body could achieve it's towering six foot four inch height and it's built like a linebacker muscle mass.

Once inside the restaurant the boy found a cluster of empty tables all the way at the back of the restaurant where it was quieter and closer to the hall that led to the restrooms, from there he could see most of the game area, but not the rest of the booths where he knew that other kids were surrounded by their loving families who were all happily munching away on the types of food he couldn't afford. It was better this way, at least he wouldn't have to see how others got to have things that he wanted yet couldn't have.

The boy was actually basking in and enjoying his solitude for a change because since he was at the back of the restaurant he couldn't hear a whole lot of the noise that usually annoyed him when tried to study at a Plucky's themed restaurant and he wondered why none of the other Plucky's restaurants he'd been in weren't built this way, because he was definitely able to do more homework here than he had been able to do in any other Plucky's he'd ever been in… The only distraction he had, had was when two of the restaurant's clowns named 'Cosmo' and "Zany' came over and spent about ten minutes seemingly trying to cheer him up and another twenty minutes lurking close by because they apparently couldn't take "Trying to get my homework done." as the 'busy, go away' that it was. But even that hadn't been so bad except for how the two brightly painted men kept giving him weird looks that made his skin crawl, but the boy chalked that up to it maybe just being their face paint that made their smiles look sort of creepy and he put the feeling of unease at the back of his mind.

The boy was worried about finishing his homework and trying to whittle away the time until his big brother came to get him and was too naive to realize just how many times the same two clowns had to go in and out of the halls to the restrooms, or notice just how many leering looks they kept tossing his way, but Present day Dean sure noticed and he didn't like the way the two bastards kept looking at his baby brother like he was a stray calf lost from it's herd and they were two starving carnivorous predators that were in the mood for veal.

As the evening wore on, the workers at the clown themed kiddie restaurant began to prepare to close for the night and the twelve year old Sam began to worry, his big brother had never been this late in picking him up before. The clown named 'Cosmo', from earlier was brazen enough to slip into the seat across the table from the boy and said "So, Sammy…" he gave a pointed look at Sam's nametag, that only read "Sam" along with his big brother's cell phone number "We're about to put up the 'closed' sign. Is there someone you can call to come get you?" as the other clown, 'Zany' stood next to the table and made the child feel crowded.

"Uh, my big brother was supposed to pick me up.." Present day Dean noticed that Sam hadn't griped at being called 'Sammy.', by someone who wasn't his dad or big brother..

"Ah.." A hungry look flitted through 'Zany's' eyes as placed a hand on the young Sam's shoulder and made a gentle caressing motion with his thumb "Big brother's aren't always the most reliable form of transportation.."

"He'll be here, he's just late." The twelve year old practically growled in his big brother's defense as he shrugged the hand of his shoulder, grabbed his backpack, slid out of the booth, pushed past the clown 'Zany' started making his way towards the front of the restaurant only to have the clowns follow him "Well, if he doesn't show up, we can give you a ride. Cosmo stated, sounding syrupy sweet, trying to pass himself off as just a nice guy trying to help someone… But Present day Dean knew these men's type.

"No, I'll be fine." The twelve year old replied and Present day Dean wanted to cheer as he watched through the twelve year old Sam's eyes and saw that the boy had instinctively gone straight for the most crowded area of the restaurant to wait for his big brother. That sure had deterred the clowns and bought Sam some peace from the pushy clowns until his big brother arrived.

When the seventeen year old Dean arrived the twelve year old Sam was just so happy that he no longer had to be stuck at the restaurant with the creepy clowns that he had momentarily forgotten how mad his big brother was at him. But his big brother quickly gave him a harsh reminder as the seventeen year old Dean had apparently had a problem with seeing his younger brother happy enough to smile.

"What are you grinning at?!" The seventeen year old had barked causing the smile to disappear from the twelve year old's face as the boy shrank in on himself with a sadly murmured "Nothing." in reply.

The seventeen year old had given an annoyed huff as he sped out of the parking lot and the twelve year old had curled up in the passenger seat and tried to ignore the ache in his head and chest that was still going strong and steady as if it had only been just three days since he had been dropped from twenty feet in the air…. Oh, wait… It actually had only been three days…

Once they were back at the hotel, the twelve year old sat idly by without complaint as his big brother took 'first shower of the night'' and hogged all of the hot water. The boy felt had been feeling as if he wasn't important enough to deserve hot water for over a year now and no one in his family had even cared to notice every time the poor child came out of the shower with a slightly grayish blue, tint to his skin. When his big brother finally relinquished the bathroom, the twelve year old Sam closed and locked the bathroom door behind him, then leaned against the door and breathed out a sigh of relief. He had been waiting for this moment for hours, the itch to pick up the razor and slice his skin, again, had been burning through him ever since he tucked it back into it's hiding place before he had gone to bed earlier and now, he couldn't hold off any longer.

The twelve year old methodically stripped off and folded each item of his clothing, and Present day Dean was just now beginning to realize that his kid brother had been and probably still was suffering from Obsessive Compulsive Disorder, because the way Sam always seemed to measure, order and time certain movements and activities, how he obsessed over something having to go 'just right' or else everything would be messed up, how the boy was compelled to do things until the compulsion pushed the child over the edge, how the twelve year old felt like if he followed all the steps, just right, then it would make everything better for at least a little while, until the compulsion would hit and he felt the obsession, the compulsion to follow the exact same steps all over again….

Once he was naked the twelve year old Sam brought out the razor and began the bittering, relieving, pleasing, punishing, soothing, sickening, purifying, shaming, ritualistic act of slicing into the flesh of his hips twice on each side, for a total of four satisfyingly, neat and even cuts. Only when he had spent a few moments tenderly doting on each one of his masterpieces and settling his personally chosen form of punishment back into it's hiding place, did the child finally step into the harsh and frigidly cold water of the shower where he began to sob over his shameful weakness as he tried to will the cleansing spray to wash away his putrid obesity, so his father would no longer see him as a fat and ugly disappointment that couldn't do anything right…

The twelve year old Sam redressed then crawled into bed and said a silent prayer, pleading to GOD for his daddy to love him again.

Present day Dean used his free hand to angrily swipe the tears from his eyes as he watched the scene fade to gray… He understood now… His little brother had started cutting as a self-chosen form of punishing himself for being overweight because he had thought that his weight was the reason that his father seemed to hate him even more and all the child had wanted was his daddy's love.

The next morning the boy got up, rolled over and noticed that his big brother had left without him and that he only had two and a half hours to find a way to make it ten miles without a car and still get to school on time, which was all, just peachy, wonderful, delightful really… Why the hell should he even care?

The twelve year old groaned as he hobbled into the bathroom then wrinkled his nose at how bad he smelled when he raised his arms to take off his shirt, he was drenched in sweat… Probably feverish…. Just great… Why did he always have to be so weak?

The boy gave himself a quick scrub down with a wash rag, gave himself just two little nicks on the flesh of his hips as a reminder that he needed to suffer because he was fat and a disappointment, then he threw on his cleanest clothes along with his ratty tennis shoes, locked up the room and went jogging towards the middle school, while trying to ignore the pain lancing through his head, ribs, chest and ankle.

He was winded when he made it to school five minutes late, he lied and said he had been stuck in the restroom when the first bell rang and seeing as he had never been tardy to any of his classes at this school before, his first hour teacher gave him some leniency and didn't make him go get a tardy slip, of course since the boy did look rather ill, it was believable that he had been stuck in the bathroom, so that might have helped just a bit. When his first class ended the boy made a mad dash for the restroom, because the dizziness was just so overwhelming that he might just really be sick, he knelt in the bathroom floor by a toilet for a good three minutes and when he felt like he might be able to stand without either throwing up or passing out, the boy moved towards the sinks and splashed some cool water on his face to try to help quell the flushed feeling that was rapidly heating up his cheeks and forehead. He cupped his hands and took a few sips of the cool liquid in hopes that eventually his rolling stomach would calm down enough for him to get to class without puking in the hallway. Luckily for him, his head and stomach cooperated for once and he was able to make it to his next class right as the tardy bell rang.

During his third hour class the entire school was called to the auditorium, apparently this school did announcements of some sort on the first school day of every month.

The twelve year old followed the crowd of other students and was happy to have a seat close to the back of the auditorium, being one of the last kids in meant he would be one of the first kids out after all and that meant less chances of a confrontation with any of the kids who loved to pick on him. His head hurt and he had to struggle to focus, the school's principal was standing at a podium in the middle of the stage and she was making announcements about certain rule changes, how the school was cracking down on Public Displays of Affection or P.D.A.'s as the kids liked to call them then she was winding down the thirty minute long waste of a school day, saying "Okay and to finish things up it's the first day of May and that means it's time to bring everyone who has a May birthday up to the front so we can all sing Happy Birthday to them!" she sounded sickeningly cheerful as she began to call out the names of the children with May birthdays. When she got to the twelve year old Sam's name, the boy froze. He had completely forgotten that his thirteenth birthday was only half a day away, actually he hadn't even really been aware that it was already May… He felt numb as he went up on the stage, but he could hear a few students whisper and he knew they were talking about him, he wanted to crawl under a rock and hide rather than go up on stage and stand there listening to the out of tune singing of 'Happy Birthday to you.', he'd be up on stage with eight other students and everyone in the audience and school faculty probably couldn't care less that this right here, this would probably be the only time he'd have the happy birthday song sang to him and no one was going to care enough to even acknowledge his name in the song, he knew that it was simply gonna be 'Happy Birthday, to all of you, Happy Birthday, to you all..'.. He'd been to schools like this, ones where they'll just cover all of a month's or upcoming month's birthdays in one fowl swoop, keeping it indifferent and impersonal just to avoid having to recognize the students as individuals and having to sing 'Happy Birthday' to each one on their actual birthday, if it fell on a school day… If they were gonna be so indifferent to the students as individuals, then why acknowledge birthdays at all?

Maybe he was just being bitter, because he knew that no one in his family would even care that he'd be turning thirteen tomorrow?...

Feeling dazed as he walked off the stage, he accidently bumped into one of the other students who had been up there with him… And great, just when he really didn't feel like dealing with a bully right now, a bully is who he goes and bumps into… Wasn't that just perfect?

"Watch where you're goin.." The bully growled "Oh" he said with a sort of glee as he realized who had just slightly nudged into him after the sudden drop off the poorly lit last steps "It's Tubby… Is your birthday in May, Tub, Tub?"

The twelve year old Sam tried to just maneuver past the bully (and seriously.. What was this kid's name again? Sam knows they have sixth hour Social Studies together, but he can't remember the much larger seventh grader's name and he knows he should know his name..)…

"Kurt asked you a question, Tubby." Another bully stated sneeringly, and this broke Sam out of his thoughts and he looked around feeling lightheaded and dizzy, something about the brightness of the light that hit him as he exited the auditorium was making him feel… Off... somehow, but he couldn't pinpoint what was wrong. He gave the last person to say something to him a bewildered look.. And… Where did all these other kids who were crowding him come from all the sudden?... Oh right, some of them had just been on stage with him, and the others, well he really didn't know where the others had come from unless the principal had dismissed everyone else from the auditorium after the birthday announcements..

Suddenly it registered that … OW! SON OF A BITCH! His head hurt!… Like someone was stabbing him in the brain with an icepick! And his ears were ringing… That was a bad thing… Right?... Why couldn't he remember if that's a bad thing?

A rough shove at his shoulder had him trying to concentrate on what a boy who was bigger than him was saying, but it felt like he was looking at the bully from inside of a fishbowl. It was a hand yanking his hair that pulled everything into focus... and... How, when, did he end up crowded up against a row of lockers?

"You havin a party Wankchester? Huh?... Your mommy gonna get you a pretty, little, frilly dress to wear on your special day?"

"Leave me alone." The twelve year old growled as he shrugged away the hair that was pulling his hair and shoved a few bullies out of his way and as he made his way into the crowd of other students, he could hear one of the bullies shout after him "I hope your mommy gets you a fat free cake, Tubby!"

The twelve year old just floated on the haze of pain for most of the rest of the day, only coming out of it when the bully in his Social Studies class (And .. Didn't he hear someone say his name earlier?) made some more scathing remarks to him where not a lot really came through except for a few key words that really registered with the twelve year old Sam like "Fat", "Tubby", "Tub of Lard"… Other than that it was just only the larger boy's hateful tone that the twelve year old Sam managed to pick up on, all the bully's other remarks pretty much sounded like the roar of ocean waves crashing against the shore…. The twelve year old Sam figured that the stupidly dazed smile on his face must have pissed the bully off because he was pretty sure that the bigger boy had issued a challenge for a fight, but that didn't matter to Sam, everything felt fuzzy and floaty and funny… Except the searing pain radiating from his skull, that crap hurt, but apparently not enough to bum him out.

When the last bell of the day rang, the twelve year old Sam started slowly wandering in the general direction that led back to his hotel room… Or at least he was pretty sure that this was the right way to go…

About half way to the hotel room, the haze of pain began to fade and most of the events of the day started to replay through his mind… Oh… Crap… Had he really just sat there and smiled as the most feared bully in the seventh grade, Kurt Bowen, threatened to kick his ass tomorrow after lunch? What the hell had he been thinking?!, Oh he was in so much trouble!

The boy hastily picked up his pace, ignoring the sharp pain that went shooting through his ankle and up his leg as he started to run towards the hotel room…

His big brother would know what to do…

He made it all the way back to the hotel room when he remembered that his big brother was super pissed at him again for whatever reason.

The child wanted to cry.. Kurt wouldn't be picking on him if he wasn't so fat! This was all his fault… His fault because he's fat! Everything would be better if he could just stop being so fat!…

Fat… Fat… Fat!

No one would care about him unless he stopped being so fat. Stopped being so useless. Stopped being such a coward. Stopped being such a failure!

He was angry and hurting and he just wanted the pain to stop and then he wanted to punish himself because he knows he deserves the pain but he also knows that he doesn't deserve to exist.. And then it's a conundrum because he's cutting and he's thinking of darker things and is it because he wants the punishment or is it because he wants something more? Because he wants to go further? And he's looking at himself in the mirror and he's telling himself why and he's telling himself the real reason's he's doing this, the real reasons why he started doing this as he drew the blade across one hip, breathing out a hiss as he did so when blood automatically appeared in the razor's wake.

"One, for being so worthless that no matter what I do, how hard I try, no one is ever going to really love me." The boy stated through clenched teeth.

"And... Two." The boy ground out as he drew the edge of the razor across his other hip "For being stupid enough to even care about still trying."

Releasing a heavy, yet almost relieved sounding breath the boy looked at his left forearm and pushed the bloody edge of the razor against it hard enough just to feel the bite as he whispered "One day. One day, I'm gonna be brave enough. One day, I'm gonna work up to being able to finally cut here."

Then the child let out a saddened sigh as he let removed the edge of the razor from his flesh, wiped the razor down then put it back into his hygiene kit as he whispered "But today I'm still a worthless coward."

The boy had just finished staunching the blood flow from the self-inflicted cuts when he heard the door to the hotel room open so he hastily pulled his pants back up then flushed the toilet and washed his hands so it would appear that he had simply been in the bathroom only to use the toilet and nothing else…

When he left the bathroom he could see that his big brother looked… Happy?

Okay, that was just a little scary… Why was he so happy?... Oooh… Maybe he was finally going to get rid of him for good today?

"You're not gonna believe this, Sammy.." The seventeen year old Dean said excitedly "I met this girl named Trish and she's a gymnast… A gymnast, Sam… Do you know what that means?"

The twelve year old just gave his big brother a blank look as the seventeen year old replied with a waggling of his eyebrows "It means she's super flexible…"

"Ugh, that's gross."

"Trust me, kiddo. In about three years, you won't think so.."

"You goin out with her?" The twelve year old asked.

"Hell yes I'm goin out with her… Listen, Sammy an opportunity like this only comes once maybe twice in a guy's life, man… You've gotta appreciate things like this, because this might be the closest you'll ever get to a chick like this.."

"What?" That made the younger boy's brain throw on the brakes.

"She's out in the car, I figured it'd be quicker to drop you off at Plucky's before swinging by her place… Her parents are gone on a business trip!" The seventeen year old sounded stupidly giddy and Present day Dean could practically hear the chant of "I'm about to get laid by the hottest chick ever!, I'm about to get laid by the hottest chick ever! I'm about to get laid by the hottest chick ever!" playing over and over again at a hundred miles a minute inside his seventeen year old self's mind… The seventeen year old boy wasn't even sparing his kid brother, the one person who was supposed to matter more to him than anyone or anything in the whole universe, anything more than a passing glance. But Present day Dean was seeing him.. The twelve year old boy looked like a wreck… And, seriously.. Why hadn't anyone noticed how badly worn and frayed the child looked? It was like the twelve year old Sam had practically been invisible back then! And he had needed someone, anyone to see him. To notice him. To notice that he needed some actual support. That he needed someone to care…

All the twelve year old could really think about at that moment was "At least Dean's happy" as the child gave his big brother a seemingly amused smirk and Present day Dean's heart broke.. The kid had needed so much help and support back then and all that mattered to him was the knowledge that his big brother was happy, but what hurt worse was the fact that the boy had felt ecstatic over the fact that it seemed like his big brother was no longer pissed at him.

As the twelve year old sat in the backseat of the Impala listening to 'Trish the gymnast' talking a mile a minute about the dumbest things like what sorts of designer clothes his big brother would look good in and how almost every other word out of her mouth was 'like', all Present day Dean could think of was how he would like to smack his past self, upside the head for having ever gone out with such a snob.. And not just that, paying a preppy, snobby, little 'princess' more attention than he was giving his little brother, whose survival had been basically depending soully on him, back then.

When they pulled up to the Plucky's, the seventeen year old Dean had been in such a good mood that he handed over two twenty dollar bills to his kid brother and told him to go nuts, then the big brother gave his little brother's hair a quick ruffle and everything was almost just like old times and it made the twelve year old Sam feel like there was some light in the darkness after all, that was for sure…

The twelve year old boy felt happier than he had been in weeks, he was so happy that he could maybe even manage to try to want to eat something for the first time in almost five whole days.

The child ate a whole slice of pizza and even went so far as to treat himself to a soft drink then he spent the rest of the forty dollars his big brother had given him on tokens, to try and win enough tickets to trade for a rainbow slinky because, it was one of the restaurant's newest and most coveted prizes and he knew his big brother would love to have one. The child hoped that it would be an adequate enough olive branch to help his big brother not get so mad at him again, at least for a little while…

But… When he had finally spent the last of his tokens only an hour and a half later, the child found himself flat broke and still twenty tickets short of getting a rainbow slinky… One of the workers at the prize counter told him that he could save the tickets up and then add them to any new tickets he might win and the best parts were that the tickets wouldn't ever expire and he could exchange them for a prize at any one of the many nation-wide Plucky Penniwhistle's Magical Menagerie restaurants, so maybe it wasn't a complete loss, twenty tickets wouldn't be that hard to get, he could easily get the rainbow slinky the next time his big brother dropped him off at a Plucky's so long as he had at least a dollar to spend for tokens…

Figuring that he still had a few hours to spend waiting for his big brother to come get him, the child made his way over to one of the tables at the back of the restaurant so he could get his homework done.

He had been sitting there for about two hours finishing up on his Language Arts homework when 'Cosmo' and 'Zany' decided that he looked 'sad' and 'lonely' and they did their clown thing where they pulled a few gags and made a few jokes and the boy knew the men were only trying to cheer him up because it was like their jobs as clowns at the restaurant to put smiles on kids' faces, but the boy just really needed to finish his homework and these two seemingly weren't about to give him a second's peace, even though they had actually managed to make him laugh when they made fun of two of the other clowns named 'Ooozi' and 'Doozie' as part of a joke that had a decent punchline.

He wondered if he went and sat closer to the rest of the crowd if they'd let him do his homework in peace, because maybe they were just trying to get him out of his shell, get him to interact with other people so he wouldn't look 'lonely' anymore…

So, the child moved over to an empty table that had a few families sitting at other tables surrounding it, and it seemed to work. Until the clowns honed in on the fact that he was still alone.

The boy knew he would never manage to finish his homework with all of the distractions around him at the moment and he knew that once he got home it would probably be really late and that he wouldn't be able stay awake through writing a two page essay on a little known historical figure named Friedrich Engles… The only way he was going to get his homework done was if he could find someplace to work where no one would distract him… When his soda filled bladder made itself known, the child had an idea, he'd just lock himself in one of the restroom stalls until he was done with his homework, no one would bug him in there…

He found out how wrong he was when about forty-five minutes later a restaurant worker was calling into the bathroom to see if there were any occupants, because he needed the restroom cleared out before he could clean up a particularly smelly mess one of the customers had made in one of the other stalls.

The boy didn't want to keep the worker from doing their job, especially since he wasn't exactly 'using the bathroom', using the bathroom… The worker probably wouldn't take but a few minutes to clean up the mess, so the child figured he'd just go back in a soon as he saw the worker come back out, so he started walking in the direction of the tables that were closest to the entrance of the hall that led to the bathrooms…

Present day Dean watched from the twelve year old Sam's perspective as the unsuspecting boy was sideline tackled and a hand incased in a white clown's glove was promptly forced over the child's mouth to muffle his shocked and enraged attempts to call for help as he was roughly pulled backwards then shoved into what appeared to be some kind of storage room for all of the restaurant's spare prizes...

The twelve year old fought valiantly to keep from being pinned to the cold, hard cement floor of the room, but his struggles were useless against someone twice his size, especially since he was still considerably weakened by the still unhealed injuries that he had sustained when the Manananggal had dropped him from twenty feet in the air... But the child truly stood no chance because there wasn't just one man pinning him, there were two. He had no chance to try and figure out where the other brightly dressed man had come from. He had no chance to try to figure out what was happening or why it was happening. His world was being turned sideways and then being left on a stilted and unstable axis. This place was supposed to be safe. He was supposed to be safe from monsters here.

Nothing really registered with the boy as one man grabbed his wrist together in one hand while using the free hand to cover his mouth, leaving the bewildered child pinned from the chest up as his pants and underwear were being tugged down to his knees by the other man.

He tried kicking the man who was stripping of his pants, but the man simply grabbed the child's knees and pinned the each of the boy's knees under each of his biceps then proceeded to not waist anytime in getting the most obstructing pieces of the lower half of his own clothing out of the way.

When the child caught sight of the fully grown man's erect member, confusion and despair washed over the boy as his bewildered mind desperately tried to understand why the evil stranger was trying to fit his manhood into a place it didn't belong. Then he was feeling blindingly, jagged stabs of pain, internally gutting him, then ripping his insides out as white hot searing of dry flesh dragged out of his torn and bloody channel then thrust back in only to turn the stabbing pain into a crescendo of cramping agony and after three more excruciating thrusts, there was a sensation that played at being a parody of pleasure that sparked through him as something inside him was occasionally bumped into, something, that his body seemed to like having touched, no matter how much his mind and his muffled screams, kept pleading 'No." over and over again. At one point the white gloved hand left his mouth and the boy tried to scream, but his shout for help went unheard and the child found himself catching a glimpse of the other man's engorged sex organ before one white gloved hand clamped his nose, and another was prying his jaw open then that fleshy phallicy was being forced down his throat causing him to choke on the obstruction in his airway and effectively muffling any further screams and pleas that the boy tried to voice.. Soon the man between his legs set a punishing rhythm that was becoming faster and even more painful as the man tried to plow further, to ravage what depths had been left untouched…. The child tried to squeeze his knees together and use what small leverage he gained to push the man between his legs away and that made occasional bump against that something inside become more frequent, the unwillfully stimulating sensation it caused set the boy to writhing and letting out a pitiful muffled wail as he unwillingly relinquished his own climax bringing tears of shame and disgust to the child's eyes as his body forced the muscles in his assaulted channel, to involuntarily clench which gave the man what he needed to achieve the orgasm that he had coveted badly enough to resort to raping a twelve year old boy...

The man who had been ravaging the twelve year old's mouth pulled away and the boy drew in a wheezing breath only to have his mouth covered by another white gloved hand and when he exhaled the only audible sound he could make was a muffled whimper as he watched the man who had been orally violating him, positioning himself between his legs where the other man had been only moments before.

The boy was dazed and exhausted and now everything seemed to go in slow motion, he watched as the blacklight that lit the room caught the florescently bright colors of the man's makeup, causing the makeup to glow and make the man's features morph into the most horrifying thing the child had seen or would ever see.. The way the man's eyes rolled back in ecstasy as he forced his still, spit slicked penis into the twelve year old boy's torn and bloody channel only served to make the image the helpless child saw even more terrifying. He heard the man between his legs growl the words "Such a tight ass." right before he felt the intensity of the pain ratchet higher as the man's thrusts became rougher and more brutal. The child wanted the pain and the humiliation and the feeling of being so helpless, to just stop. He prayed to GOD that the men would please just stop hurting him and let him go... The man who was now between his legs pinched his thighs muttering about how baby fat turned him on and how he loved how 'this one' is so chubby..

When the man between the child's legs finally reached his climax, both bastards released their hold on the boy, allowing the child's aching and trembling body to curl in on itself..

The men left the boy discarded on the floor as they propped open the backdoor to the storage room and were brazenly, audacious enough to step out and have a smoke while they discussed how to 'get rid of the boy'. This allowed enough desperately needed time for the child's mental faculties to re-engage, survival instinct, came tripping over his fragile hold on consciousness and rushed to the forefront, to let the boy know that he couldn't afford to disappear into the safe refuge of his mind, no matter how tempting it was, he needed to stay awake, he needed to move, he needed to find a way to get away, or else he might not live to see the end of the night... The child wanted to tell his stupid survival instincts to shut up to leave him alone and let him die, to ask them where they were when he had so desperately needed their help to avoid what those men had done to him... Why hadn't he been able to keep them off of him?... Why hadn't he been able to get away?... What was the point in living, now that he had the proof of his weakness, failure and utter uselessness, in the form of the slow trickle of blood and the two rapists' ejaculate streaming from his battered and abused rectum?... He simply wished to grant himself the small mercy of giving up and dying right then and there, lying broken and half naked on the cold concrete floor... But, damn it! His survival instinct was forcing him to stay awake. No matter how hard he tried to will it, death wouldn't let itself be captured so easily, he was so weak that he couldn't even just die right! And the longer he laid there in the floor, the more that stupid and hard to silence survival instinct kept insistently nudging at him to move, to do something other than lay there helplessly...

"You're no longer being pinned down." His instincts told him. "You can move. You need to move."

The child reached down with a shaky hand and managed to pull his jeans up from his ankles to his shims, but when he got the pants to his knees, the extent of the combination of both his old and new injuries began to make themselves known... His body was littered with new bruises in various places, most of them were in or near places of an embarrassingly intimate nature. The discovery of more evidence of his weakness and failure made the boy want to give up all over again. His father would never love him now and his big brother would be so ashamed to even know him...

But his instincts to survive were strong and they forced him to make his body comply so he could get his pants all the way back up around his waist where they were supposed to be.

Once he was fully clothed again, the child rolled to his side in an attempt to crawl to the door that led out of the room and into the safety of the crowded restaurant… He had gotten about a foot when he could no longer stand the annoying lump that was cutting into his hip every time he moved, so he patted a hand to the side pocket of his jeans and wanted to hit himself in the head as he realized that he still had his cell phone and that it wasn't damaged from the assault, unlike him...

Unsure of what to do, of who to call, the child battled an internal war with himself. Should he call nine-one-one?... His dad would be so angry at him for dragging 'the officials' into their lives, into their business... His dad had too many illegal activities going on, with all of the continuously committing identity fraud, continuously impersonating a police officer and an armory of illegal weapons stashed in the truck of the Impala, making it too much of a risk to potentially involving anyone with a REAL uniform or badge.. But if he couldn't call nine-one-one, then who could he call in an emergency like this?...

The twelve year old hastily pushed the speed dial for his father's cell phone number and listened in horror as it went straight to voicemail... Then he remembered that his dad wasn't around right now anyway… He was on a hunt, two states away, while his twelve year old son was struggling for his life after being attacked by PEOPLE, and Bobby, Mac and Caleb were on the other side of the country and Pastor Jim was in Thailand… The only other person he could call was his big brother.

Praying that his big brother would answer his cell phone, the twelve year old dialed the seventeen year old Dean's cell phone number...

"..'Lo..' Came his big brother's groggy reply.

"Dean, I need you..." The twelve year old cried pleadingly.

"No can do, Trish wants to show me her floor routine." The older boy sated with all sorts of hints of innuendo lacing his voice… And with that the other end of the phone call was cut off, leaving the twelve year old staring at his cell phone...

He really could just lay there and die and his family would be none the wiser... Would they even care? Would they be ashamed of his failure, of his weakness if they ever found out what sorts of disgrace he had allowed himself to be subjected to before he died?

The boy tucked the cell phone into the side pocket of his backpack, which had been stripped from him at the start of this nightmare then thrown against the wall by the door, it's not like the phone would be of any use now, he had already attempted to call all of his available emergency contacts and the backpack and all it's contents no longer mattered, it hadn't ever mattered...The child wanted to laugh... All the effort he had put into school, into hunting, into life, it was all for nothing... It was all just pointless really, he could barely make his agonized body move even just another inch and he definitely couldn't stand to open the door... The searing, tearing pain was radiating from everywhere, he felt nauseous and dizzy and he just wanted to let the darkness lay claim to him and beg it to never let him surface from it's abysmal depths again. Even the sudden will to try that had kicked in due to the surging forth of his survival instincts was whispering to him that it was okay, it was okay to let go, he had at least tried his best to live through this nightmare, it was telling him that he had done all he could do... It was okay. He could die now.

A feeling of resignation washed over the twelve year old Sam, he knew he was breathing his final breaths. He vaguely wondered if this was what a drowning person felt like when they realized they weren't going to be pulled from the water in time… That their fight to survive, had been futile…

Present day Dean could hear his own harsh words being played back to him from his own repressed memory of the time the Spectre had possessed him, the angry words that the Spectre had caused him to growl at Sam… "You left me to die for a girl?!"… and it made him want to kick his own ass, because yeah, the Spectre had caused him to say those horrible words out loud, but Sam had been right… He had been thinking them, with enough vehemence to mean them. He hated himself for even thinking it now. Because Sam might have tried to move on with his life after thinking he had just saw his big brother die. But he had not just left his big brother to die, not like his big brother actually had done to him…

One of the men came back in and gave a raucous chuckle as he said "How cute, you tried to get away."

The twelve year old Sam gave a pained groan as he rolled onto his back, his last act in life, would be to face the man who was going to kill him...

The man stood in the darkness, his form silhouetted by the dim street light coming through the back door, he let out an unfriendly chuckle and there was a flash of light then the mechanic sounding whirring of small gears turning, one of the man's white gloved hands moved up and pulled something and started to shake it and when he lowered his hand the boy could see the small square… It was a Polaroid… The man had just taken a picture of him… He watched with trepidation as the man started moving towards him. The man's face paint lit up with an eerie glow as he moved through the shine of the blacklight. The boy tensed up as he realized the man was palming his crotch… Oh, god, the man was going to hurt him again!.. He was fine with laying there and dying, but he was NOT going to just lay there and let the man do THAT to him again… Not again… Please not that again…

But how was he going to stop him?

He felt his heart's already thundering pace picking up speed his breaths became wheezy and panicked as the man knelt back down and pulled him closer. He almost passed out as the man leaned closer and he could smell an underlying stench of cheap, bottom shelf whiskey on his breath.

The man's touches turned to gentle caresses starting from his shoulder working their way down to his wrists, where the caress stopped and the man began to play with one of the bracelets on his wrist. It was the one his big brother had given him as an early birthday gift last year…

The man's fingers gave a playful tug on the bracelet, forcing it free from the twelve year old Sam's wrist and the child's stomach churned as he realized that the picture, the bracelet, the man had taken them as some sort of memorabilia, the man was collecting 'trophies', from him.

"Please." The twelve year old Sam whispered with a broken sob. He didn't know whether he was begging the man to not hurt him like that again, to just kill him quickly or to give him back his bracelet, because it meant something to him… Probably, all of the above.

"Shhh." The man whispered as he brought a box cutter out of his costume's pocket.

The sight of the metal, gleaming in the light made the child shrink away out of instinct as the blade neared his face. But then this anger, bubbled up from his depths… Cutting was his… It was his chosen punishment for his weakness, for his failure… He wasn't going to let this man, who didn't even know him, use a blade on his skin… Cutting was his… Why couldn't the man have just chosen to beat him to death, or shoot him in the head?... Cutting was his…

The boy gave a choked sob as fear laced adrenaline gave him a second surge of strength, he lashed out and grabbed the man's wrist, then they were both struggling over the box cutter.

The blade came awfully close to his face again and for one second a hysterical terror shook the boy as he looked up at the man's brightly painted face and thought that the clown was going to stab him in the face… The shudder that ran through him was enough to shake him out of his depths, it woke something inside of him… Something vicious, something angry, something righteous. He wasn't going to let himself die. Not like this. Not today.

Anger, Adrenaline, and a feral, animalistic urge to cut the man who had hurt him… Yes… Cut him. Cut him. Cut the bad man. Punish the bad man.

The boy felt an out of place smile adorn his features and the man on top of him was taken aback with a look of confusion flitting through his eyes as he gave an almost delighted sounding whisper of "Are you some kind of crazy?"

Oh, if only this guy knew the half of what real kinds of 'crazy' actually looked like he would tuck his tail between his legs and go running for the hills, leaving a trail of urine and feces behind him, because it would terrify him that damn much. This man and his buddy were nothing more than cowards who had to rape a vulnerable child to make themselves feel, bigger, badder and more manly.

The twelve year old Sam only gave the man a look of feral glee in response as he used the man's momentary distraction against him and bent the man's wrist, forcing the sharp point of the blade at an angle that was turned towards the man's torso. The man had a second to look down, another second for the realization of what was about to happen to dawn on him and before the next second ticked by, the box cutter's blade was buried in the not so hollow space above his hip, cutting several nerves and possibly a tendon, the wound wouldn't kill the man, but it would hurt like hell and it would leave irreparable damage that would leave the man with a limp and lots of pain from that area for the rest of his pathetic life.

The second the man fell off of him, the animal inside him went back to hide in it's den, leaving the boy lying on the floor wondering just what the hell had happened, he was frightened that he had just murdered a man… A person! Another human being!... But, as he laid there feeling dazed, he could hear the man gasping in pain and muttering threatening vows of vengeance of all the horrors he would inflict on the boy if he got his hands on him again. The twelve year old heard movement from outside. The other man was coming back! All ability to think, abandoned him and his mind didn't slip back into itself until he had somehow managed to be standing by the front window of the restaurant, surrounded by people, and noises and lights… He felt like his skin had become six sizes too small, everything felt too crowded, but it was safe in the crowd and he didn't want to be alone… But he felt wired and skiddish as the bustle of people carried on their business around him like he were invisible. Parents were scolding children for not playing nice with others, toddlers were crying, whining or throwing tantrums over not getting their ways, various restaurant workers were going about their tasks like usual. Like everything was normal. Like none of them could possibly know what two of their own were capable of… And there were clowns in the crowd.. So many clowns… He didn't know how to tell them apart from the ones who had hurt them. All their bright colors just melted together and spelled out 'bad' and 'evil' and 'monster' and branded them forever in the twelve year old's mind as something to always be feared.

The boy shifted his backpack from one shoulder to the other and realized that he didn't remember grabbing it. Didn't remember getting out of that room.. He could barely remember fighting back… Holy crap… He had fought back…

He had fought back and he had won!

He had gotten away. He had survived what they did to him… The thought was somber and depressing… But… It was also… Empowering?

Because he had fought back.

And somehow against all odds.

He had won.

But, he knew that he still wasn't safe. Not yet… First he had to get out of the restaurant without those bastards grabbing him again. Then he had to tell someone what those sons of bitches had done to him or else they would remain free to do it to someone else. Someone else who might be younger than he is. Someone else who might not be able to escape with their lives intact.

Something had to be done. The bad men needed to be punished.

The bad men needed to be punished.

It felt like electricity was coursing through him. Every movement he caught out of the corner of his eye was like a fresh jolt to his system, making him almost jump out of his skin. Every time he caught a flash of bright color, he felt his heart clench with shocks of pure horror.

Then, his cell phone rang, startling him, making him flinch and whimper at the sudden noise that was coming from so close to him, form a place he couldn't see. It took a few tries to swallow the feeling abject terror crashing through his entire being, but finally he was able to retrieve his phone from it's resting place in the side pocket of his backpack then choke out something that might have been 'yeah' or 'hello' and it definitely didn't sound like a wordless and panicked hitching of his breath as he had tried to stifle a sob.

"I'm out in the parking lot waiting, so get a move on." His big brother had commanded and the boy wanted to break down crying. His rescue, had finally arrived….

He would be safe now.

The boy rushed out to the Impala without even looking back at the horrid, clown themed restaurant because he had already made a promise to himself that he would never go back to a Plucky's ever again. He winced and tried not to cry out in pain as he gingerly eased himself into the seat of the Impala.

The second the Impala pulled out of the parking lot, the twelve year old finally allowed himself to breathe a little easier. Now if only he could work up the courage to tell his big brother what had happened.

He felt a painful knot of tension form in his stomach. If he told his big brother what had happened he would be sacrificing any hope that Dean would ever find a way to love him again. But if he didn't tell and those bad men hurt another child, maybe even killed another child, it would be all his fault. He knew he was a coward and a failure, that he was slow, weak, fat and useless. But he could do this one thing. He could make sure that those bad men never hurt anyone else.

The seventeen year old Dean was talking animatedly about how his 'date' with Trisha went and he wasn't sparing any of the raunchy details, making the twelve year old feel a sick sense of disgust and shame twist through his already sour stomach, knowing how the seventeen year old Dean viewed sex, the twelve year old couldn't bring himself to tell his big brother about what had happened, he would rather die than ever have his big brother know what had happened to him. Suddenly it was as if he had to protect his big brother's innocence, because his big brother thought sex was a good thing, which meant that he didn't know about how bad and painful sex could be and he didn't want to taint another good thing in his brother's life with his own failure.

The boy felt almost elated at seeing his father's truck parked in front of the hotel room. His dad was home. His dad was a grown up, he would know what to do, he would know how to handle this situation.

He just hoped to god that his dad would be sober enough to listen.

The child limped into the hotel room knowing that no one would care to question why he looked like he was in such agony. His small family would probably just assume that he was only still feeling the pain from his bruised ribs and sprained ankle, they would never guess that more injuries had been added to the tally.

The Winchester patriarch was sitting in the dark, at the small kitchen table, flipping through his journal with one hand and clutching his phone with the other when his sons came in.

Their dad looked up and gave a sideways nod in greeting then said "Dean, I need you to go grab me something to eat from the all night diner down the road."

"On it, dad." The seventeen year old replied as he turned back around to head out to the Impala. The twelve year old Sam knew that his dad was most likely drunk, he could see the tale tell glazing over of his father's eyes even from across the dimly lit room.

He did not want to be left alone in the room with his father right now. He doubted he could listen to his father's drunken venom, even if he did deserve that and more, without falling apart at the seams and he knew that he needed to keep it together at least until he knew for sure that those men would pay, then and only then could he allow himself to unravel.

"I'll just go with…" the twelve year old stated nervously as he made to follow his big brother out the door.

"Sam, you stay." His father commanded sternly "You and I need to talk."

Oh crap. Did his dad already know? How bad was his delayed reaction going to be over this newest disappointment from his youngest son once the oldest was out of earshot?

The seventeen year old Dean was already pulling the Impala out of the hotel parking lot before the twelve year old could object.

The twelve year old closed the hotel room door and stood frozen, rooted to the spot as his dad scooted his chair away from the table, stood up and held up his phone and said "What is the rule about calling me while I'm out on a hunt?"

"Only in an emergency." The twelve year old replied.

"Only in an emergency." His dad stated with a nod.

"It was an emergency." The child proclaimed.

"Really?... If it was such a big emergency then why didn't you leave a voicemail?"

"Because when I couldn't get a hold of you, I hung up and tried calling Dean…"

"You disobeyed a direct order…"

"Dad, I need you to listen to me.."

"I don't wanna hear it…"

The child snapped and let out an ear piercing shriek "I NEED you to LISTEN TO ME!"

The second his shout echoed off the wall, his dad pinned him to the wall, causing the child to panic and try to writhe away as the smell of cheap liquor assaulted his nostrils and the image of his father faded, and blurred until it wasn't his father towering over him anymore, it was a man with a brightly painted face and a tauntingly, mocking grin. The sight had the child trembling all the way from his very core.

A sharp slap to his left cheek made him breath in a wheezing gasp as the horrifying image of the sadistic clown who had been about to kill him, still held, but his father's voice poured through, growling "You will never dare to even think you can demand something from me ever again, you ungrateful brat!"

The image of the clown faded leaving only his father sneering down at him as his father continued on with venomous words "There are monsters out there ripping apart the lives of innocent people and you're thinking that whatever your current little drama is, matters more than that?! Well, it doesn't matter! It's never going to matter! You need to get it through your selfish little head that there's a world full of people out there who need to be kept safe and that it's our job to hunt down the evil sons of bitches who would try to threaten any of them… You called me while I was on a hunt, Sam! The damned monster that I spent two days tracking got away and now some poor person could die because of YOU!"

The child rubbed a hand against his sting cheek and he tried to hold his tears at bay as he reached out a hand and pushed his drunken father away and looked up at the man with a blazing glare full of plenty of venom of his own as he snarled at a man would had just lost all of his trust and every ounce of his respect "Yeah, well people can be monsters to… dad.." The boy practically spat the last word before he continued with "So, maybe the next person that monster gets a hold of will deserve to die, just as much as you apparently think I do."

With that the child pushed his way away from the wall and stormed towards the bathroom, ignoring his father's confused and angry "What the hell's that supposed to mean?"…

The boy closed and locked the bathroom door then allowed his body to sag against it as tremors began to wrack his aching body and the tears began to fall in earnest… He stayed there, sobbing quietly, desperately trying to compose himself. His big brother wouldn't stay gone forever and he had to be able to act normal when Dean got back. Because for as long as he lived he would never, ever let his big brother find out what kind of 'monster', the man he considered to be his hero, could be… He would rather die and be damned to the deepest level of Hell before he would ever taint his big brother's love for their dad. He refused to ruin that part of Dean's life. Because he knew that if Dean ever found out, Dean would get angry and in the first few moments in that anger, he would kill their dad… But when the anger began to fade, that anger would turn to the reason that had made him kill his own dad… And while the twelve year old could withstand his big brother hating him over a stolen and ruined childhood, he could not withstand his big brother hating him because he was the reason Dean murdered their father.

Only after he heard the sound of his big brother's voice did he know that it was safe to come out of the bathroom, because he knew his dad was all big and brave when they were alone, but the man would never be stupid enough to even try to have the guts to hit him in front of Dean.

So, the boy calmed his shaking body and let himself just simply go emotionally numb, because if he didn't then his mask would crumble and his genuine state of distress would show, he flushed the toilet, ran a little water over his hands and stepped out of the bathroom with his hair hanging in his face to hide the red mark that he knew would probably be adorning his cheek by now as he climbed into his bed and laid down facing the wall. He would have to find some other way to make the men pay for what they did to him, because he was never, ever, going to tell his family about what had happened.

Present day Dean's body was heaving with bone deep, grievous sobs as everything faded to grey…


	8. Chapter 6. Part 3.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

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> Still part of Chapter 6..
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> Chapter 6 was over 100,000 words long y'all.. So it had to be broken down.. It had to be broken down.. A lot..
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What those bastards had done to Sam had been the worst sorts of savagery imaginable and Present day Dean's heart was broken, but his blood was also boiling at the same time… Because those bastards… All of them, his father included, had deserved to pay and he knew for certain that his father hadn't actually ever paid for how he had abused and neglected his own son… But what he didn't know was if the men who had raped his little brother, had gotten away because of ignorant and negligent fools who had refused to listen to the voice of the youngest, most vulnerable member of their family and that was pissing him off the worst. Because he should have known, he should have done something, he should have made sure those men had paid dearly for having dared to have even thought about touching his little brother like that. But he hadn't known, he hadn't done anything, because he had basically ignored Sam's attempt to tell him, making the vulnerable child with already frayed emotions and multiplying trust issues to start shutting down, then John Winchester had made things even worse with his cruel words and literal slap to the face, making the child believe that what had happened to him didn't matter, making him stop trying to get through to either of the very people he should have been able to rely on no matter what.

Knowing that his brother had suffered so much, would now, torment Dean forever, because his ignorance, his negligence, had allowed all of those horrible things to happen to Sam. And… His SELFISHNESS, his cruelty, his thoughtlessness, had pushed Sam into suffering with all of that horrible devastation, alone and in silence…

Present day Dean tensed up as muted colors and muffled sounds began to filter back into the scene, but it wasn't because past Sam was waking up, he was having a nightmare..

There were flashes of bright colors, the look of ecstasy on the morphing and contorting, painted faces of terrifying clowns that warped and grew knife like fangs and there was pain, so much pain radiating from the child's most intimate of areas as the boy started to struggle to get away from his horrifying attackers.

The child's body gave an agonizing jolt as one of his legs kicked out in his panicked frenzy to defend himself from painfully groping hands that were encased in white clown gloves and all of the ways the boy knew the bad men would hurt him. When his leg kicked out, it startled him and he gave a quiet gasp as it jolted him awake. He had learned long ago to wake up quietly from even the most horrendous nightmares.

The boy could feel jagged stabbings of pain caused by the injuries he could feel inside of him and was afraid to move because he was certain that he would rip in half long ways, from the bottom up, if he did. It wasn't that he was afraid to die, he just didn't want his father and his big brother to be left with the burden of a gory mess, covering the hotel room bed, that would need salting and burning and of course, salting and burning property of the hotel might get them in trouble with not just the hotel manager, but with the law as well, he would hate for his death to be just as much of an inconvenience to his family as his life seemed to be, after all.

Seconds later the alarm went off and he knew that he really had no choice in the matter, he had to somehow be able to manage getting his pain ravaged body out of bed without falling apart under the onslaught of the agony, he had to be able to get himself to school, had to be able to go through the day acting as if there was nothing out of the ordinary going on…

He took it slowly, tentatively inching himself close enough to the edge of the bed so his legs could just fall to the floor, putting half in and half out of bed, he managed to get his right arm under his side and was able to work through the pulling and bruising and tearing sensations as he sat up.. Now if only he could stand without collapsing…

It took a lot of biting back the pained whimpers, hisses and groans and a lot of fighting off wave after wave of nausea and dizziness and a LOT of patience, but he finally struggled to a stand and then managed to propel himself into some semblance of momentum that took him in the general direction of the bathroom. The child used his hands to place against the wall, to keep himself steady enough to not fall down and to guide him because he was being blinded by the intensity of the torturous misery jolting through him, shredding him as he moved…

Once he was safely inside the closed bathroom, the child released a quiet sob, it hurt so bad, ALL OF HIM, just hurt so bad…And he felt so dirty, so tainted, so bad and wrong, he didn't know if there was even anything good, left in him at all… If there had ever been something, anything in him that could have been worth loving, worth protecting, worth saving, at all…

He gritted his teeth and hissed as he started gingerly stripping off his clothes… The same clothes he had worn the night before because he just hadn't had the strength or energy to change them, but now that they were off, he wanted to never see them again, he wanted to burn them… The clothes smelled like them, they reminded him of what they had done to him… He wanted them gone, forever, if at all possible.

He desperately wanted to take a shower, but he really didn't have the time for anything other than scrubbing himself down with a wet rag and a splash of cologne and two smears of deodorant to mask his body odor.

When he worked his underwear around his thighs, it didn't escape the child's notice that they felt crusted over and sticky and he didn't want to look, didn't want to see.

He looked anyway.

He swallowed his startled gasp, and the outraged scream of horror that wanted to follow. There was blood, and it was fresh and plentiful. A new sense of terror poured into his veins. How was he going to manage hiding this? How was he going to keep from bleeding through his pants as he went through the day at school?

Feeling humiliated that his big brother or his father might find the bloody clothes he wrapped his bloody underwear and the jeans and tee shirt he had worn the night before in one of the spare plastic grocery store bags that were stored under the bathroom sink, then he placed that bag inside of another bag, then wrapped another bag around it. Then he limped over to the bathroom closet where the duffle bags were kept and groaned as he knelt to stuff the bundle into the bottom of his own duffle bag before retrieving a different set of clothes to change into. Standing back up caused a nice new array of pain and he choked down the yelp that wanted to escape him. The child leaned heavily against the sink to balance himself as he waited for the waves of nausea and dizziness to pass once more, then he dressed his shaking body in harsh denim and a long sleeve flannel shirt despite the heat outside and stuffed folded up toilet paper into the seat and crotch of his underwear in hopes that it would keep the blood from seeping through his pants.

The boy stayed as quiet as possible as he gathered up his backpack, to keep from waking his father, who had fallen asleep on the hotel room's couch with the neck of a half empty bottle of Jack Daniels clutched in the hand that he hand dangling off the edge of the couch.

The Impala was still in the parking lot when he walked out of the hotel room, which meant that his big brother was around, he heard the thunk of a soda being spat out of the vending machine next to the door of their room and looked over to see Dean retrieving the soda.

He watched his big brother lean against the machine, the look on Dean's face was stormy with anger again and he knew that if Dean was pissed then he was probably pissed at him… Once again the frail bound between them, that had just started to show signs of mending only the previous day, was becoming frayed and the child felt powerless to stop what was left from unraveling completely. It made him bitter inside because he was pretty sure that their father being back had something to do with why his big brother kept basically ostracizing him from their brotherhood at almost every turn.

He wanted to snap "What the hell did I do to piss in your oats now?!", but he bit the inside of his cheek instead and waited for Dean to indicate whether or not he would be magnanimous enough to give him a ride to school.

His big brother pushed away from the machine and stalked toward the Impala without so much as another passing look towards Sam, seemingly answering the child's question for him so he started to head off in the direction of his school, because he was certain that Dean was too pissed to even ride in a car with him.

He heard the clank of an empty soda can hitting the ground and wanted to turn on his heels and snap at his big brother for littering. Actually he just wanted to SNAP at someone, anyone in general and was just looking for an actual opening that his anger could tear through, of course his big brother wasn't going to give him that opening.

But that didn't mean that his big brother wouldn't do some tearing of his own.

Past Sam had made it to the corner of the parking lot and had just set foot onto the sidewalk that ran alongside the street, when the Impala pulled up beside him, driving slow and keeping pace with him. He wanted to ignore his big brother and his big brother's anger. Because he was hurt and bitter and jaded and didn't want to deal with any bull crap right now, not even from Dean…

But his big brother was persistent and young Sam finally turned his head and met his big brother's gaze with a hurt and hardened one of his own.

"You got me in trouble with dad." The seventeen year old Dean's words sounded calm and thought out. Which meant that Dean was FURIOUS with him.

The younger boy turned his head and stared at the sidewalk as he continued to walk as the Impala drove beside him, he gave a weary sigh, he could only imagine all of the ways that Dean could get in trouble with their dad and all of the ways Dean could make it his fault…

He didn't want to ask, he knew he would regret asking. Because EVERYTHING is somehow always his fault and he's so tired of being on the defensive. He doesn't want to ask. He doesn't want to open himself up for another attack. He's so tired of being attacked.

But he asked anyway. Because it was Dean and he cares about Dean and caring about someone means caring enough to always ask, it means caring enough to always try.

"How?" And he was honestly confused. Was it the way he breathed? Was it the way he looked? What had HE done to get Dean in trouble with their father? As much as he didn't want to know, he did want to know the specifics of how HE had done something that had caused Dean to get into trouble. It's not like he made Dean's choices for him and he damn sure knew that he DID NOT make John Winchester's choices for him. So how exactly was Dean getting into trouble with their father, his fault? Inquiring minds would really like to know the answer to that…

"You called him while you knew he was out on a hunt." The older boy replied with a glare.

Oh yeah, he was well aware of that, "Thanks so much for reminding me, Dean." his mind lashed out in pain and anger. But the younger boy repressed it. Bottled it up and buried it. He shrugged because if he gave some kind of verbal response he was sure he would say something that would get his ass kicked.

"He said that if you had time to 'play around with your cell phone' and make a call to him when it wasn't an emergency then I must not be keeping you busy enough to keep you from doing something stupid."

The younger boy clenched his fists at his sides and quickened his pace despite the searing stabs of pain that were ebbing through him in time with each footfall. He wasn't going to respond. He wasn't going to respond.

"I can't believe you sold me out like that." The seventeen year old sounded genuinely hurt "After I've always made sure to drop you off at a place you'd have fun. You went and sold me out to dad and now he thinks I'm not taking good enough care of you and that I need to crack down keep you under lock and key unless you're going to school, training, doing chores, at the library doing research for a hunt or actually going on a hunt. Is that what you want Sam? To be on permanent lock down?!"

His anger had bubbled to the surface and he couldn't repress the surge of venom that poured out of him as he stopped walking and turned to face his older brother "It's not like you'd give a damn either way what I want! You made sure to always drop me off at a place where I'd have fun?! Well, I hate to break it to you but the pizza taste like ASS and the ice cream is grainy, I HATE IT THERE! It was an emergency when I called dad last night! I was hurting everywhere! The other night I told you that my head hurt and that I didn't want to go and last night EVERYTHING hurt so bad, it felt like I was dying but neither one of you could even give a damn!"

The Impala had come to stop beside him and the hurt look on his older brother's face was enough to break his heart and he was glad that he had managed to contain himself enough to keep from shouting what had happened. Because his brother looked like he was feeling guilty now. And Dean didn't deserve to have to feel guilty over anything… He did not want Dean to feel bad or guilty for what had happened to him and if the look on his big brother's face was any indication then Dean would blame himself and if Dean would blame himself then it was possible that their father might find a way to also blame Dean… He hadn't thought of that before. Of how their father might hold Dean responsible. It was yet another reason why he would never tell his family what had happened to him.

His vision was blurry and he suddenly realized that tears were steadily streaming down his cheeks, he spun back on his heel and stormed off in the direction of the school, limping as fast as he could go, it was like his anger, his bitterness, his shame and his fear were all combining to intensify his pain and he didn't know which hurt worse, the physical pain or the emotional.

The Impala pulled alongside him, once again keeping pace with him. "Sam, Sam, get in the car."

The younger boy shook his head.

"Sam, maybe you still shouldn't be walking on that ankle. Come on, Sam. I can see you limping."

"It's not like you care!" The younger boy growled. He was shaking, he was so angry, he was hurting so much and he just wanted to hurt someone, make them hurt as bad as he was hurting, but he didn't want to hurt his big brother and he felt so bad because he didn't mean to hurt Dean. He really didn't mean to and he was so very sorry. Tears were rapidly cascading down his face and his body was heaving with silent sobs as he kept walking, refusing to look over at the Impala driving alongside him, refusing to see what sort of damage he might have just unwittingly caused in his moment of uncontrolled anger. Present day Dean wanted hug the kid and let him know that he hadn't done anything that the seventeen year old jackass sitting in the Impala hadn't deserved.

"Look.." The seventeen year old Dean's voice had lost it's cold edge "I'll just tell dad that you started feeling really sick last night and that's why you called and then… Then neither one of us can be in any trouble."

The younger boy stopped walking and he was trying to get his shaking body back under control as he turned to face his big brother "Really?" he asked, with a weary voice that was laced with suspicion and distrust.

"Yeah." His big brother's tone was now calm and understanding…. It wasn't much, but a fragile truce was better than no chance of peace at all "Now get in the car, Sam."

When he started bending to get into the car his body rebelled, every part of him was catching alight with throbbing, searing, stabbing, electrifying, shredding, cutting, tearing, cracking, popping, breaking, bruising and chilling pains that were all radiating from different locations, flooding though him, pouring into his core and combining to cause him shear misery that ached so deep he could feel it in his soul and he wanted to break down and wail and shriek and rage because it all hurt too much to bear. But he had to bear it. He had to bear all of it, alone.

His family could never find out.

He could feel the toilet paper that was folded up in his underwear, shifting, then wadding and bunching up, reminding him of why certain areas of his body hurt so much as he gritted his teeth through the process of easing down into the passenger seat. He had to hide the pain. Couldn't let Dean see, the full extent of his pain.

His big brother was watching him with a look of genuine concern on his face and the younger boy knew he had to say something that would keep Dean from getting suspicious. "My ribs are still really giving me hell.", he even tried to give half of a fake smirk to show it wasn't as bad as he was making it out to be.

The seventeen year old Dean just gave the younger boy his an annoyed shake of his head before rolling his eyes and saying "Yeah, bruised and cracked ribs are never fun."

The older brother got another concerned look on his face and extended his hand.

The younger boy tensed, but braced himself to keep from flinching away as his big brother placed the extended hand on his forehead "Man.." the big brother stated sounding worried "You really do feel pretty warm. Maybe you should stay home today…"

"No!" The younger boy replied with a hasty shout "No." he tried to sound calmer "I wanna go to school.", because god knows he did NOT want to stay home with the possibility that his dad would be hanging around the hotel room today. Even if there were hopefully more odds that his father wouldn't be mean to him or hurt him while he was sick, than there were odds that his father would get pick back up in the middle of his bender, get even more drunk and say cruel things and maybe even beat him, the boy didn't want to risk putting himself in a situation where he was wrong about those odds.

A look of understanding flitted through past Dean's eyes, but then it was gone and Present day Dean knew that it was because he had buried that understanding under the denial he had been steadfastly piling up back then. Instead of reaching out to his kid brother and giving him some kind of sign that he wasn't alone, he had simply given a disbelieving chuckle and said "You're such a geek, dude, only you would actually want to go to school instead of staying home… But… Whatever, man. I better not get a call from dad sayin he got a call from your school's nurse's office and he needs me to pick you up cause you're barfing everywhere and they wanna send you home."

The younger boy let out an annoyed huff "I'll be fine, Dean." and he even managed to give an eye roll to sell it. He had to keep his big brother as far from the ugly truth as possible.

As the Impala pulled up in front of the middle school young Sam grit his teeth and took deep breaths as he carefully pried himself out of the seat and hoped that when he got out that he hadn't bled through his pants or his big brother would see…

He looked down at the seat and was glad to see there was no evidence of blood.

"Thanks, for.." He wanted to say "Not making me walk today… But his brother looked guilty enough as it was. So he just left the sentence hanging and simply gave half a grin and a wave as he closed the Impala's passenger door and headed into the building.

For once he was on time to actually eat breakfast, but, go figure, his stomach was revolted with the idea of eating anything, so the boy went ahead to his first class knowing that the room would be empty, but safer than the bathrooms right then, and that he would get maybe a few minutes of peace to just let his mind and body finally settle down so he really could last out the whole school day without getting sent to the nurse's office.

He took deep breaths and with some practice he figured out a way to push past most of the less severe pain, but no matter what he did, he couldn't push past the agony in his most intimate of areas, the cramps in his abdomen, the pounding of his head or the aching of his ribs.

He'd just have to find a way to go through the rest of the day feeling like his insides had turned to acid, like his head was about to explode, like his lungs had been used as punching bags and like his torn rectum had experienced the inside of a blender set on 'Puree'… That shouldn't be too hard…

In the middle of his first hour class he could feel an uncomfortable wetness and he realized that he might be bleeding through the toilet paper.

In a panicked rush he hurried to his teacher's desk and declared an urgent need for a Hall Pass.

"Is there a problem Mr. Winchester?" His first hour teacher droned inquisitively. "This is the second day in a row you've had some kind of bathroom issue that's conveniently crept up during my class."

"Ugh…" A small groan of pain escaped him as he tried to think of what to say "I ate some chili the other night and I don't think it agreed with my stomach." When in doubt, always use chili as a reason for a seemingly upset stomach… Grownups should be able to understand that sort of thing..

"Something like that wouldn't last two days.."

"It would if I was stupid enough to eat the leftovers yesterday before I figured out that maybe that's why my stomach's been bothering me."

His teacher wrinkled his nose as if he could potentially smell the results of indigestion caused by chili as he said "Then by all means, please, take a Hall Pass, and in the future, if your stomach gives you issues over certain food, either don't eat them or get your parents to get you some sort of antacids or something, because I can't keep allowing you to miss so much class."

"Thank you." The boy said with a whoosh of a relieved sigh as he accepted the hall pass. He realized that he was going to have to think of a better solutions to both getting to school on time and dealing with his newest 'issues', because he doubted his teacher would give him anymore leniency in either Tardy Slips or Hall Passes for the rest of his time at this school.

He assumed that the blood had yet to bleed through the denim fabric at the seat of his jeans because no one who had a good view of his rear as he had made his way to the front of the class or now as he stood at the teacher's desk had made any sort of snarky remarks about it. Which he supposed was one of the small silver linings of almost always being the subject of almost everyone's gossip, because he knew for sure that if there was any hint of blood showing then the vultureous gossips would have definitely said something insulting about him by now…

The boy resisted the urge to back out of the room or worse yet, cover his rear and thus draw attention to the area, as he hurried out of the classroom as fast as his injured body would allow him to go and made his way to the nearest bathroom, where he locked himself inside one of the empty stalls with a heaved out sigh of relief that he had managed to make it to his destination without passing out or without blood pouring through the back of his jeans.

He gasped in pain as he inched his jeans and underwear down, god it hurt so bad. He gave a tentative look downwards and he barely tuned in enough time to collapse to a kneel by the toilet and heave out the meager contents of his stomach into the toilet's basin rather than all over the floor and walls of the stall.

The toilet paper had scrunched up and waded into an elongated oval ball that was soaked with absorbed blood and was covered in fresh wet blood that it could no longer absorb. It was a disgustingly stomach churning sight to behold. Just thinking about the gory mess down there made his stomach lurch and acidic bile wrenched itself from his core.

"Oh, god. Oh god." He chanted in a whispered sob and his body became wracked by frightened and pained tremors as he began to violently expel more acid and bile and the occasional chunk of something that looked like peperoni or pizza crust with tulmultuosly loud hacking and choking and gurgling sounds that he couldn't contain.

Once it was over he felt so shaky, so weak, it was hard to stay conscious, but he fought the strong pull of oblivion that was trying to shroud him in it's cloak. He took a few deep gulping breaths and re-foraged his meager strength enough to grab a hand full of toilet paper and cover the blood soaked wad so that he wouldn't have to see it as he removed it and dropped it into the toilet then he used the wall to brace himself as he struggled to a stand and flushed the sickening displays of his failure and weakness down into the sewers.

He took a few more breaths to calm himself then grabbed so more toilet paper, this time making two wads, one wad he used to line his underwear and the second he stuffed between his cheeks in hopes it would absorb more blood and thus keep the blood from going any further than the streak and the few specks that had made their ways into the seat of his underwear but not through them to the seat of his jeans. He knew his family couldn't afford him having to throw away yet another pair of jeans.

He had made it all the way through his fifth hour class before having to rush as fast as he could back to the bathroom between classes to change out the toilet paper. This time when he looked, he was ready for the revolting sight and he was able to brace himself, it seemed the bleeding had slowed and the toilet paper was only half soaked and the blood that had leaked into the seat of his underwear earlier had become grossly tacky/sticky, but was nearly dry.

The child changed out the toilet paper again, this time making the wads thicker in hopes they would hold through the rest of the day…

In his sixth hour Social Studies class his stomach started clenching and rebelling for a different reason. With everything that had happened, he had completely forgotten Kurt Bowen's PROMISE to kick his ass after school today, but Kurt had gladly reminded him.

He started fervently praying that when he exited the building after the last bell of the day, that there would be a black, 4 door, '67 Impala waiting for him out in the parking lot with his big brother behind the wheel.

The boy ignored Kurt Bowen's attempts to make him rise to all of his baiting during class and when the bell rang he made a beeline straight for his next class before Kurt could try to attack him in the halls.

He had made it to three doors away from his class when a group of sixth grade girls passed by him and he overheard a snippet of their conversation.

One girl who was wearing a pink skirt a white shirt with a screen printed pink and purple butterfly and whose whole demeanor screamed "Sweet and innocent!" and "She's a little girl!", "She's just a little girl!" was telling her friends that her birthday was tomorrow and that her family was taking her to Plucky's for her party and she was inviting her bestest friends, who were also 'sweet and innocent little girls' they were just kids… God, the three of them couldn't be more than eleven. And Sam felt ice water pour into his veins because those bad men were still free. The bad men were still free and little kids were still going to that Plucky's and the bad men were still free. They were still free and they could hurt someone else.

He suddenly couldn't breathe!

Oh, god! The bad men were still free and they were going to hurt someone else!

"No." The boy choked out with a panicked whisper "No, no, no." he chanted. The bad men had to be punished, they had to be locked away. He had to do something. He had to make it to where the bad men couldn't hurt anyone else!

Today was a Thursday, that meant his seventh hour Science teacher would be taking his science class to the school library. It was part of "teaching them about the science of computers and technology".

It also meant he could use the school's internet to find out some very important phone numbers and information.

He made it to his Science class and stood by his desk, waiting for his teacher to tell the class to head across the breezeway to the library. About five minutes later he was sitting at the computer table in the library, typing "How to make an anonymous tip to law enforcement." into the internet search engine.

He looked through all of the results and found a few methods that would suit him best along with phone numbers for the state field office for the F.B.I, the state police, the county sheriff's office and the local police department.

The child knew he had to be careful. One because he didn't want his family to find out and Two, most importantly he did not want them involved in any way.

He knew that the bad men had taken a picture of him and that they had taken the bracelet his big brother had given him last year for his birthday and that his blood had been on the floor of that back room and even if it was cleaned up, there were still ways for law enforcement officers to find enough traces for a D.N.A. sample. All it would take would be for one of the officers to ask around the Plucky's to see if anyone recognized the frightened looking child in the Polaroid the evil clown had taken of him, then the search would probably lead to his school where his teacher's would reveal his name and then his family would be involved…. UNLESS… His family had disappeared by the time the officials figured out who he was…

Doing what he was about to do, it would be hugely risky. But he had to. The bad men had to be locked away so they couldn't hurt anyone else. The bad men had to be punished.

He knew his father was good at disappearing and good at keeping certain authorities off their backs, the man had been evading police, F.B.I., Social Services and C.P.S. for YEARS and nothing could make the man pack his children up and move them three or more states away after laying tons of false leads that wouldn't pan out than the indication that someone might call C.P.S. because they might have saw some bruises on one of his kids.

The boy had just finished writing the vitally important numbers down along with the most suitable ways for someone like him to leave an anonymous tip, when the librarian cleared her throat and said "It's just come to my attention that we've got two birthday boys in here today! AND.. That means both boys get to pick out a book from the library that will be theirs to keep for free!"

Young Sam could practically hear everyone rolling their eyes at once in annoyance over the pointless distraction.

"Would Alex Guthrie and Sam Winchester please come up to the counter to pick out their free books?" The librarian asked.

Sam folded the paper and tucked it into his bag pack as his brow furrowed in confusion.. Because… Why did she call his name?

Today wasn't the second… Was it?

Then he remembered standing on stage in the school Auditorium while everyone sang 'Happy Birthday' and he remembered how he had vaguely registered that it had been the First of May… Had that really only been just yesterday? It felt like it had happened days ago and for some reason it still didn't really feel like it should be May yet… But somehow it apparently was… He had turned thirteen and wouldn't have even known it, possibly for days, had the librarian not reminded him.

Now, he felt even more emotionally wounded because no one in his family had even thought to so much as acknowledge that he had turned another year older. It was even more depressing when he realized he almost hadn't turned another year older, that if he had died he would have died the bad men would have gotten away with his murder and his family wouldn't have remembered him as anything other than a chubby twelve year old who had ruined their lives up until he disappeared, if they cared to remember him at all…

He trudged up to the counter and picked out "The Adventures of Huckleberry Fin." not because of his own similarities with 'Huck Fin' but because of Dean's similarities with the book's lead 'hero' and he hoped that one day, that his big brother would read the book, see inspiration in some of the story and 'escape' from their drunk of a father…

As he accepted the book he leaned in and asked the librarian for a Hall Pass knowing that the bell wouldn't be ringing for thirty more minutes, but his Science teacher was too busy reading "Golf Digest" so he might not notice that he had slipped out of the library before class let out. The librarian gave him a disapproving look as if to ask him why he wasn't asking his teacher but he gestured to his busy teacher and shrugged as he whispered "He's wearing golf pants and brought the magazine from home, the man's clearly dedicated to the sport. It'd be heartless to get between them"

The librarian gave a quiet chuckle and handed over a Hall Pass with an amused shake of her head and the thirteen year old Sam hoped that she wouldn't notice that he'd be staying out for the rest of the hour…

The boy went straight for the closest bathroom which was in the building across the breezeway and five doors down from his Science class, the exact same bathroom he had used between his sixth and seventh hour classes.

He made sure the bathroom was empty then locked himself in a stall and pulled out the sheet of paper with phone numbers and information on it and started to dial.. Starting with the State Field Office for the F.B.I. that covered Hillsborough County, Florida…. And just his luck, it just so happened to be right there in Tampa…

The thirteen year old boy knew he'd have to now get his family out of town within mere minutes of making these calls because he knew the Feds would probably (hopefully) act fast…

The child knew that for this plan to work he had to get his father to get the hard copies of his and his big brother's school records, then his father would hopefully be smart and lay the groundwork for a couple of false trails that led in the opposite direction from where they had actually gone… But to get that to happen as fast as he needed it to he needed more than 'A teacher might have seen some of my bruises.", he would need 'A teacher DID see some of my bruises and looked like they didn't believe my excuse, asked a lot of serious sounding questions that implied how THEY think I really got those bruises and then the teacher had 'stepped out' for a few minutes'… which his father would interpret as 'C.P.S. on it's way now, possibly serious jail time imminent, must move now, must remove as much evidence that we ever lived in Florida as possible, must get as far from Florida as possible, must avoid setting up base in Florida like the plague for at least the next three years….'

His father would most likely call to check up on the story and when he found that his youngest child's Science teacher really wasn't in class the man would panic, drive down to the middle school withdraw the boy from school and collect the records before heading over to the high school and doing the same thing with the seventeen year old Dean… Or, at least Sam hoped that things would go that way…

The child listened as the phone rang over twenty times then switched over to what his big brother called 'elevator music' , but of course a line for 'Anonymous tips' to the F.B.I. were bound to be busy in a place where drugs and gang violence were a big issue…

When a voice finally answered him he told the young sounding woman on the other end of the line the nature of the crime he was reporting, along with a detailed description of what he knew about the crime including the 'work names' of the two 'clowns' who had committed the crime and the 'trophies' he knew for a fact that one of the perpetrators had taken from their victim after having made clear threats against the victim's life and after both perpetrators had given a clear verbal indication that the victim in question had not been their first and they both also gave clear verbal indications that others they had victimized had met their untimely demises by their hands and how the alleged criminals (because everyone's innocent before proven guilty according to law, even though Sam new the bastards were as guilty as sin) had implied that all of their victims had been as young or younger than the victim of the crime being reported who was a male within the age range of eleven to thirteen years of age.

The young sounding woman on the other end of the line must have been able to hear the way his voice cracked as he gave a detailed description of the crime (only leaving out that he was the victim of said crime and how badly the bastards had hurt him)… She had called him 'Sweetie' apparently knowing he was a child no matter how grown up, how professional, how detached he had tried to sound, she had urged him to stay on the line while she transferred him to a supervisor… But the thirteen year old wasn't stupid, he knew the second he was transferred the 'tip' was no longer anonymous, that the supervisor could demand his name and threaten him with charges of 'Obstruction of Justice' if he didn't tell exactly how he knew what he knew… Like… How did he know that one of the alleged perpetrators had been stabbed above the hip by the victim? As the only way he would have known that was if he were actually in the 'closed off back storage room' of the referred to Plucky's establishment which was the alleged location of said alleged crime and the only way he would have been in there was if he were an Employee of the referred to Plucky's establishment, he was actually one of the alleged perpetrators of the crime or he was the victim and the second a supervisor heard the youth, the fear, the pain lacing his voice, it would be obvious which one of the three he was and his family would be drug into the middle of something he would have no control over… His father would probably be eventually locked behind bars and his big brother would probably be taken to some sort of Juvenile Detention Center or another "Boy's Home" which might be just as bad… He couldn't do that to Dean or to even their father no matter how much of a drunken ass the man could be.

The thirteen year old hung up before he could be transferred then he placed three more anonymous tips, one with the Florida State Police, one with the County Sherriff's Department and one with the local police and all three other branches of law enforcement also tried to 'transfer his call to a superior', which he hung up before any of the transfers could go through.

Then the boy called his big brother's cell phone and told Dean that his seventh hour Science teacher had seen some of the bruises on his side because his shirt had rode up when he went to pick something up off the floor and that the teacher had pulled him aside and started asking how he got the bruises and hadn't seemed to buy his story then the teacher had 'stepped out' and had been out of class for a while now. He told his big brother he had snatched a Hall Pass when no one was looking and had locked himself in the bathroom so he could call him and find out what he should do. To which his big brother had calmly replied "Stay there, I'm calling dad. Don't move till he comes to get you. Which bathroom are you in?"

"The one down the hall from my Science class. Dean… I'm sorry. I really didn't mean to screw up…"

"Sam." His big brother said sternly "Just.. Just don't worry about that kind of crap right now. Just don't move till dad calls your cell phone and lets you know he's there. If they don't know where you are then they can't find you. And if they can't find you, they can't take you away. Got it?"

"Yeah."

The boy listened to the other end of the line disconnect and knew his brother was calling their father. The boy would have done it himself but in the last second had realized that having Dean be the one to make that call would be safest for BOTH of them, as their father couldn't get angry with either of them this way…

He stood in the bathroom stall trembling with fear because everything had to go just right, it had to. The boy looked down at himself and lifted his shirt. Oh, there was plenty of visible bruising, especially on his left side, so the boy made sure that the toilet paper in his underwear was replaced with two fresh new wads, then he pulled his pants up high over his waist to cover not only the obviously finger shaped bruises on his hips, but the shameful evidence of his cutting.

After making sure that when his father came to see exactly how bad the bruises the 'teacher had seen' were, that the man wouldn't be seeing anything more than just those bruises, the thirteen year old let out a sigh and tried to ease his building stress over the messed up situation.

About ten minutes later, his father was there and when the thirteen year old boy showed his father the bruises 'his teacher had seen' the man's face had grown pale, because the bruising was BAD.. Cracked and bruised ribs were never pretty and the bruises left after whatever happened to sustain such an injury almost always looked hideous. Even though the Winchester family had gotten so used to that sort of thing by then that it had gotten to where they no longer noticed when each other were covered in bruises unless someone pointed it out. And now that someone had pointed it out it was clear as day that the child's left side was covered with black, blue, purple, green and yellow bruising. It looked like the child had been badly beaten and John Winchester had good reason to be turning copy paper white.

"Okay." The boy's father said with a nervous gulp, but the thirteen year old Sam was so caught up in his own nerves that he wasn't noticing how AFRAID their father had been in that moment... "I want you to go out to the truck and I'll be out after I get your records and sign the papers to withdraw you from the school."

Present day Dean could see that the man was doing his best not to draw attention to himself as he hastily walked towards the office, it was a good thing for him that no one had actually been looking because in that moment the man couldn't have been more obvious. Present day Dean lost sight of the man as the thirteen year old Sam turned and headed for the parking lot.

The boy tried to climb up into the cab of his father's truck and it felt like he was being ripped apart again. His abused body did not like the way he was trying to exert himself past the limits of his injuries, but the child gritted his teeth and hauled himself into the seat anyway, then began to silently sob because now he was hurting so much worse down there than he had been hurting since this morning, the only time it had hurt even worse down there than he was right now was during the thing that had happened to cause the injuries he had sustained down there that were now causing him so much pain. He curled in on himself and cradled his aching stomach as he rested his head on the passenger side door. Kurt Bowen had no idea how easily he was getting off because even with all of his pent up resentment, his irrational anger, his hormonal teenage angst, the seventeen year old Dean would have kicked the boy's ass if things hadn't played out the way they did and the moron had wound up hurting his kid brother… About five minutes later the thirteen year old Sam's father had climbed up into the cab, tossed a stack of files into the middle of the bench seat and peeled out of the middle school parking lot without so much as a passing glance at his youngest son, and the thirteen year old Sam wouldn't have had it any other way, because he would rather his father ignore his existence than find some reason to punish him for his existence…

Five hours later the Winchesters had packed up and were already in Mississippi where they stopped to get gas and the thirteen year old Sam had rushed to the bathroom as fast as he could to make sure the blood still hadn't leaked through his underwear, the bleeding had seemed to have gotten a bit heavier and he had gotten lucky as sitting down seemed to have held the flow back a bit, but now that he was standing it was trickling freely. It was enough to have the child stuffing a wad of toilet paper into his canal… It was a big mistake. Pain, lanced through the area and jolted up through his abdomen, nearly taking him to his knees. But he had to find a way to keep the blood from seeping through his pants, so he heaved out harsh pants and quietly choked out sobs and finally succeeded in getting an elongated ball shoved into the entrance of his rectum, then he stuffed a thick wad of toilet paper in between his cheeks and lined his underwear with another thick wad just to be safe. Once both of their family's vehicles were gassed up and some road food was bought, they were back on the road and headed West, this time with the thirteen year old Sam riding shotgun in the Impala rather than in the truck with his father because the boy would feel safer in asking his big brother for emergency pit stops than he would his father. Another six and a half hours later they were in Texas where they stopped again and the thirteen year old Sam had once again went straight for the restroom to change out the toilet paper. Seeing that the toilet paper wouldn't continue to serve his purpose he was pressed into the desperation of finding a different means to hold the blood at bay. The boy crept out of the men's restroom, seen that no one was really in the store besides the cashier who wasn't really paying any attention to anything else besides the gas pumps where his family's vehicles were parked, then he snuck across the narrow hall into the lady's restroom which had just one toilet and one sink and… Exactly what the child had been hoping for. A small machine that he could pay a quarter to get a super absorbency tampon and he luckily had exactly a quarter in his pocket from having picked it up in the parking lot of the last gas station. He had exerted extreme effort to keep from passing out as inserting the thing had been easier thought about than done, and the humiliation from knowing that he had sunken so low that he was resorting to these measures, was too much to bear. But he knew that it was the only way he would last for another tank of gas as now that they were in Texas they would be driving slower to avoid getting pulled over by one of the many stringent cops that loved to pull people over for the most minor of traffic infractions and thus they would be using less gas… Meaning it would be a while before they pulled over again, unless he, like told his big brother that the Impala's interior was about to be redecorated with vomit or explosive diarrhea or something big like that anyway and the thirteen year old could not risk them just pulling over to the side of some back road or out in the woods somewhere for him to handle his 'plumbing problems' just because they didn't need to fill up on gas yet…. The child ignored how it felt like the coarse cotton fibers of the tampon were like Brillo Pads that had been dipped in corrosive acid, scrubbing at and eroding away the delicately sensitive and already shredded, lining of his intestines, as he slid into the Impala's passenger seat and he gritted his teeth to ride out the pain jolting through him as the Impala drove over plentiful bumps in the road as his family continued to travel West down interstate ten… Another eight hours, had them filling up on the other side of Texas as road work had held them back and had eaten up their gas, the thirteen year old Sam had went straight for the men's room and was relieved to find that his idea was still working at keeping the blood at bay, so he left the loathsome thing in place and simply stuffed three wads of toilet paper down there to maintain any overflow and hoped it would hold till he could get into a bathroom that could offer him more privacy, because he knew that removing it would make him scream and there were other people in the restroom and he couldn't risk bringing any attention to himself. Ten hours later they stopped in Arizona where the thirteen year old Sam had resorted to lying to some harmless looking old lady to get a quarter so he could sneak into the women's restroom to suffer the humiliation of trying to control his rectal bleeding with yet another tampon, he couldn't believe that he was actually using a feminine hygiene product and he could imagine just what sorts of jokes his big brother could razz him with over it. Three hours later, his small family stopped at a diner in Nevada where once again the thirteen year old's family had failed to notice that he wasn't eating and that something was definitely wrong because the boy hadn't ever needed to use the bathroom this much on any kind of cross country trip between hunts. And in Nevada Sam had once again headed straight for the restroom where he stuffed more new toilet paper into his underwear just in case of overflow and about another twelve hours later, they had made it to a small town in the Californian desert where they finally officially stopped to settle down again for a little while.

The one silver lining about moving was once they were dis-enrolled from a school then the days they missed during the move up until they re-enrolled in another school couldn't count against them so long as they didn't, like, miss six continuous months in between moves, or hadn't missed some 'really' important standardized testing or something like that… But a day or two, even a week, no one would really bat an eye at, the school would normally just double up on both boys' homework so that they could 'catch up' grade point average wise, as each school had it's own system of requirements for students to fulfill to be able to pass onto the next grade, and so long as they had proof that one school had passed them into a certain grade other schools would put them in that current grade. Present day Dean could remember one time when he was in the middle of the eighth grade he had actually gotten to have a pretty lazy few weeks in one school he had gone to because the previous school he had been in had actually been ahead in their lessons, thus he had been ahead in all of the new school's lessons… There was also a pretty big down side… Present day Dean could remember one year when he was in fifth grade and part of his records had somehow gotten lost, so the last grade he was recorded to have passed into had been the third grade and he had been horrified because the school was actually going to put him in the third grade because that's the grade his records last showed him being in even if it had been dated two years prior… It was what the school would have had to do as they had, had no proof that he had passed into any other grade for that two years. His records had eventually been found and he had been allowed into the fifth grade without any more fuss… But… John Winchester had actually learned his lesson from that particular debacle and had started getting the hard copies of his sons' school records each time he withdrew them from a school from then on and the plus side to that for a man who sometimes couldn't afford to have his movements tracked, was that the school wouldn't be able to know where John Winchester had relocated his children to as John always laid false trails and in this particular instance if anyone would have tried to track them through Sam's and Dean's school records they would have found four different school districts that the boys had suddenly been enrolled into via fax, phone and mail and all of those school districts were in the North East portion of the country and John Winchester wouldn't be enrolling his children into the school that they'd actually be attending until the following Tuesday, as the new school they'd be going to didn't have any school Monday, and only a week or so later, would he pull the boys' records from the other schools and no one would be the wiser because no one would have actually been thorough enough to realize that they'd never actually had any students named Sam or Dean Winchester attend their schools..

Present day Dean could imagine that since his father had resorted to the desperate measures of such deep subterfuge while dragging his sons all the way across the country, that the man might have actually been scared enough to piss himself, over the epic proportions of what sorts of trouble he thought he had just narrowly missed when in reality Sam, had lied about the teacher seeing the bruises and had actually probably just saved his own bastard of a father from being drug into the middle of a Federal investigation that would have most likely gotten him into the exact same sorts of hot water that the (accurate) allegations of child abuse and neglect would have, except for the fact that John might have been able to worm his way out of charges of child abuse with promises of going to Anger Management classes, counseling, A.A., parenting classes, etc… then the second the officials would have let him go and have his sons back he would have taken off with them and disappeared.. Whereas if he had gotten drug into a Federal investigation where his youngest child was a rape victim, he wouldn't have been able to just move his children off and his entire life, the way he parented his children would have been put under the most thorough types of legal scrutiny and it would have eventually come to light just how many times either Sam or Dean had gone to school sporting obvious yet unexplainable injuries, just how neither child ever seemed to get those obvious injuries medically treated, just how lacking both children's medical histories were, how much the children always seemed to be on their own with no adult in sight for sometimes days or weeks, which would have led to charges of child neglect at the very least, which would have probably led to (accurate) allegations of child abuse and John would not have been able to weasel his way out of those things so easy because, Feds would have been involved and they would have been able to make sure the charges stuck and came with hefty jail time and by the time it would have come down to talking about such allegations, the Feds involved would be invested and devoted to making sure an innocent little kid who had already suffered so much, too much, didn't have to worry about going home to a monster. And the second the other things they could have pinned on John Winchester would have come to light the man would have already been conveniently locked firmly in a cell where he couldn't just run from the consequences he would have brought down on his own head…

In all honesty, John Winchester had gotten off too damn easy if anyone were to ask Present Dean… And John probably never knew just how lucky he was to have a kid who had made sure that the most horrible kinds of monsters were kept from hurting any other children while at the same time selflessly saving his abusive ass of a father from experiencing a lifetime behind bars.

Present day Dean, damn sure knew how lucky he was, because if Sam hadn't told the lie that had got them out of Florida before Federal agents and State Police had rolled in, then the Winchester family would have been split apart, John would have eventually been sent to jail, Sam to foster care and Dean… He had been seventeen back then and already had his own list of various crimes he could have been implicated in, crimes he could have been charged as an adult for and unless he had would have gotten a sympathetic judge who would have actually paid attention to his file and just how being raised the way he had been had been what screwed him over, then he could have wound up in jail as well… But even if he hadn't wound up in jail, he had been seventeen years old and only eight months from turning eighteen, the best he would have been able to hope for was getting sent to either another boys home or some sort of disciplinary reform school, he would have probably ended up losing the ability to contact Sam, he might have gone through the rest of his life without having ever seen Sam again…

Present day Dean's soul ached with the mere thought of what he could have lost if Sam hadn't put THEIR FAMILY,FIRST… He let out a wailing sob as he felt each time he had called Sam selfish and ungrateful coming back and hitting him like vicious slaps to the face and punches to the heart that he knew he deserved… He was sorry. He was so damned sorry….

Once the family of three had brought their meager belongings, from the trunk of the Impala and the cab of their father's truck into the small cabin they would be staying in, for at least two weeks, things became… Tense, needless to say. John Winchester had started grumbling that 'If Sam's ribs had been properly taken care of in the first place.' to the seventeen year old Dean and thus, making it somehow DEAN'S fault that the bruises adorning Sam's torso were still visible, making the seventeen year old Dean look at his kid brother with all of that same resentment and irrational anger, that kept continuously bubbling to the surface whenever his father stacked SAM onto Dean's shoulders as something that was solely his responsibility, once again. Then the man had rounded on Sam and blamed his thirteen year old son for being stupid enough to let a teacher see his bruises, with scathing remarks of "I know I've told you plenty of times to never let your guard down, to always be aware of all of the possibilities that could happen in any situation, you should have been watching what you were doing, Sam, then none of this would have ever happened..", thus making it Sam's fault for just about everything else and once again, John Winchester had remained blameless, the man had probably even thought of himself as a victim of the thoughtless and careless, actions and behaviors of his CHILDREN…

John Winchester had gone on a rant on how the seventeen year old Dean was grounded until further notice for not having made sure to do something that would have made the bruises fade faster, thus making it somehow DEAN'S fault that the bruises that had been adorning his kid brother's torso were still so visible, which made the older boy glare at his kid brother with that look of resentment, in his eyes, as he left to go get food from the gas station/diner, down the road like his father had ordered him to. And once Dean had pulled away, their father growled at the thirteen year old Sam that he would be spending the weekend with his ribs wrapped in towels that had been soaked with apple cider vinegar so that the bruises would fade faster, but once the weekend was up he had better be ready, because he was not only still in trouble for having called him in the middle of a hunt when 'it wasn't an emergency', but now he was also in trouble for 'having his head so far up his ass' that he didn't think to keep his shirt from riding up when he bent down and 'Look at the mess it's caused!" and he was going to be running a hundred laps each day after school as punishment for his stupidity and carelessness.

The thirteen year old Sam had wanted to snap that his 'head' hadn't been the only thing 'up his ass' this week, but the boy had bit down his angry retort and retreated to the bathroom, because it had been two days since he had been pinned down in the back storage room of some Plucky's restaurant and he still hadn't had the chance to take that shower he had promised himself the day after it had happened…

Once he was in the bathroom he bit his right fist as he sat on the toilet and used his left hand to remove the things he had been using to keep the blood from seeping through his clothes, then he flushed the ugly, bloody, mess, then he let the tears fall, because his body was still hurting so bad, his family hated him again, and the bleeding wasn't stopping, it wasn't even slowing down, in fact, it had gotten worse, and he didn't know what to do and it was all crashing down on him at once and he still doesn't know if any of the law enforcement agencies he had called had acted on his 'tip' and.. What if no one had taken the 'tip' seriously?... What then? It would mean he had just caused more problems for his family for absolutely nothing, that's, what then…

The rush of thoughts made him feel panicky, on edge… and angry… Bitter… hurt… afraid… ALONE. And the silent tears, they just fell faster while giving him no comfort or cathartic relief at all.

The thirteen year old took in a gulping breath and swallowed a mournful sob as he stripped off most of his clothes and stepped into the frigid spray of the shower, still wearing his underwear because he had to get the blood out somehow and in his frayed mind, taking a shower in them seemed like as good as method as any.

But then, he felt stupid. (He always felt stupid, even when he didn't think about it, the feeling was always right there, lingering just below the surface.) When he stepped out of the shower his underwear were waterlogged and so they were causing a horrible, murky brown and watery red/pink, mess in the floor at his feet wherever he walked and he felt a sense of horror welling up inside of him, because he had no way to clean it up… He had no way to clean all of this up.

He couldn't think straight. He didn't know what to do. He was hurting, he was bleeding, he was dying. And no one could care less over anything other than the mess he had made, that he was always making, out of their lives just by simply existing…

The child took a few breaths to try to steady himself, but his body was trembling now and he couldn't make it stop. He couldn't make it stop. He just wanted it to stop. Why wouldn't it stop?

The room was spinning and tilting as he felt his eyes rolling back into his aching head….

The collision with the wall, just before he slid down it, jarred him back to awareness, but now he was in the wet floor hissing through the fresh waves of pain that were crashing through his lower half and he knew that he must have torn himself even more, because it felt like his body really hated anything that resembled crouching or squatting, and doing anything that resembled either of those things too quickly made it feel like the muscles in his intestines were being ripped down the already present tears.

He was in agony and he knew that he had to do something. Part of him was begging to tell his father, his big brother, someone, and damn the consequences because he needed help. But he knew that his father wouldn't want to listen to him and if he did the man would somehow find a way to blame him and Dean and if he told Dean then their father would probably find out anyway.

He felt so helpless.

A few moments passed and then he had an idea… He retrieved the clothes he had worn on the night it had happened from the bundle at the bottom of his duffle bag and he used them to mop up the mess, then wrapped them back up and tucked them back into their hiding place.

After the filthy, blood tinged water was mostly cleaned up, the boy stepped back into the tub, toed off his underwear and proceeded to wring them out not knowing why he hadn't thought to do it earlier. He guessed he must have gone through some sort of state of shock or something, because he couldn't really remember why he had worn them in the shower when he could have just hand washed them in the sink. When he had them wrung out, he put them into another plastic bag to be added to the dirty laundry later.

He could hear his father's voice chastising him for his stupidity and then he remembered why he had done it.. He was stupid… A fat, stupid, worthless, failure.

Once he made sure the bathroom was as clean as he could get it, he put on some fresh underwear and lined them with enough toilet paper to soak up a small lake, then he put on a pair of sweatpants that would ride up high over his waist so that no one could see the finger shaped bruises or the marks that he had made on his own flesh as he'd be having to go without wearing a shirt for the next two days.

When he exited the bathroom his father was coming through the small cabin's front door with a large pile of towels bundled stacked on top of his outstretched arms.

His father kicked the door closed and ordered him to stay out of his sight until he was called to have his ribs wrapped with the, soon to be, foul smelling towels, so he went into the room he would be sharing with his big brother and tried to take his mind off of his physical and emotional pain, by reading the book he had gotten as the only birthday gift it seemed he'd be getting this year, from his previous school's librarian.

About ten minutes later his big brother traipsed in looking exhausted from the cross country drive and said "Food's in there on the table if you're hungry."

'Yeah, I'd just love to eat something right now.' The thirteen year old rolled his eyes at his bitterly sarcastic thoughts, his big brother didn't know that his entire abdominal area felt like it was being mauled by a pissed off grizzly wielding a chainsaw.

He took a deep breath and tried not to sound petulant as he replied "Not really hungry." but it still came out sounding like the cranky pout of a two year old that hadn't gotten his way.

The seventeen year old Dean's response of "Whatever. Suit yourself." hadn't sounded much better.

The thirteen year old wanted to tell his big brother that he was sorry for getting him in trouble with their father again, but he was a coward who didn't want to risk the pain of having his apology rejected then thrown back in his face along with a few purposefully stinging remarks to go with it. So, he said nothing and just pretended to keep reading.

A few tense moments of silence passed then his father was commanding him to take care of his ribs while making remarks that insinuated that he should have known how to take care of this sort of crap, himself sooner. He wanted to point out that he had just turned THIRTEEN only two days ago and …. What THIRTEEN year old should have to learn how to take care of their own cracked and bruised ribs by themselves?!

His father was such a HYPOCRITE!, Always telling him that he had to obey his father's commands because he is a CHILD and he doesn't get to have a say in any kind of matter because he's NOT an adult then turning around and telling him in the same breath that he needs to GROW UP, that he should have already learned how to take care of his own injuries by himself a long time ago, when he's sure that even a few fully grown people with medical licenses wouldn't be able to pull that off without some sort of help that the thirteen year old Sam sure as hell did not have available to him as he did not have his own monetary means to pay for any kind of healthcare, nor did he exactly have room to carry an X-ray or CAT Scan machine around in his back pockets… So, how in the hell was HE supposed to be able to actually take care of his own injuries by himself, if he couldn't go to a doctor on his own or get use of the kinds of equipment he'd need to know the severity of an injury? How in the hell was HE supposed to be able to take care of his own injuries by himself when he couldn't get ahold of the medicines he might need to keep infection from setting in or the medicines that he might need to keep pain or fever at manageable levels? Hell, he couldn't even afford a box of Band-Aid's on his own! He was THIRTEEN YEARS OLD for crying out loud! Did his father NOT get that?!

Oh, right, his father actually DID get that, but only when it was something he needed to use to remind his child how inferior he was, how he had no real choice but to eventually comply with John Winchester's commands or be beaten, bullied, threatened and/or manipulated into submission, how he had no other real choice but to deal with it because John Winchester could do what he wanted to and with him and there was nothing he could do about it because he was just a child, unless he wanted to risk tearing his family apart by telling someone on the outside about how he was being treated at home by his father.

The boy stamped down on his anger as he came to stand in the kitchen in front of his father and allowed a man that he no longer trusted to wrap his still fragile and vulnerable ribs with apple cider vinegar soaked rags.

The child had thought that he would never get another show of tenderness from his father ever again, now that it was so apparent how much the man hated him, so as his ribs were wrapped he found himself surprised that his father's touch was gentle, almost like he might actually still care. It made the boy want to start crying again, because he didn't know what made his father more cruel, the purposefully hurtful words and actions that the man sometimes cut into him with, or the small show of something that might be caring with the sole purpose of holding it just out of arms-reach then ripping it away the second it was close enough to try to hold onto. It was like the worst sort of psychological warfare.

Once the towels had been wrapped around his bruised ribs, a plastic bag was wrapped around him so that he wouldn't get the beds or other furniture wet with the vinegar. This made it hard for the child to breath, both because of the foul smelling vinegar that stung his sinuses and because of how tightly his ribs had to be wrapped. And he'd have to be sleeping like this. In ninety degree heat in a place where the air conditioning was crappy… This would be so much fun…

The plastic bag wrapped around the outside of the towels was already making him feel sweaty and the wetness of the towels wasn't helping with cooling him down, but was actually serving to make him feel like he was stuck in a vinyl body bag while trapped in a sauna.

Trying to sleep was definitely going to be tons of fun.

When he was finally in bed, he tossed, he turned, he flopped, he flailed, but he couldn't get comfortable, it was too hot and too hard to breath to get comfortable and he was still in too much pain and his mind was in overdrive with "What if's?", "Should have done's.." and "Why didn't I's?", he wasn't going to be sleeping anytime soon.

It took his older brother's annoyed whisper "Settle down and go to sleep before I come over there and beat you with some shoes stuffed in a pillow case." to get him to finally go still enough to fall asleep, and that was only because he had a feeling that his big brother actually would stuff some shoes into a pillow case just to have something to beat him with so he wouldn't have to actually touch his kid brother even with his fists.

The scene didn't stay greyed out for long before the thirteen year old Sam was jolting awake with a weak, pointless flail and a silent scream for someone to please help him. The bad men had chased him into his dreams and found a way to continue hurting him even there and now he might not have even a second's worth of decently fulfilling sleep ever again.

And he was so very tired.

But there was nothing but futility in trying to go back to sleep. It was two in the morning and knowing his father, the man would be up in about two hours which would mean he would have to also be up in about two hours as well, or he would get accused of being lazy by his father.

He laid in his bed looking up at the ceiling, remembering a much better time in his life when it seemed like all of his troubles could just melt away, for at least just the briefest of moments, with the simple act of seeing what pictures he and his big brother could find by 'connecting the dots'.

The child laid there starring up at the ceiling and his imagination failed to see any sort of picture at all, no matter how hard he tried. He couldn't get those carefree moments of innocence back and he couldn't re-enact them because those moments felt like nothing but lies now. Because, he hasn't ever been worthy of that innocence.

The world felt so small now, because of just how much the bad things seemed to smother out the all too rare good things. The bad things were making the world small and the only way it was ever going to get any bigger was if people started actually started to fight back against the bad things with the only weapon that would actually work against them. If people just started to love each other with open hearts and open minds, no one would want to hurt anyone anymore and then all the bad things, all the bad people would have no choice but to go away because there would be no place in the world left for them to grow their seeds of evil anymore.

He knew it was naïve to hope for a world were no more bad things existed, but knowing what he knows about evil, a world without bad things, without evil, is the only thing he really can hope for.

Because in that world, he wouldn't have been raped, in that world, his mom would still be alive and his family would be happy and whole and never in any danger of being ripped apart by monsters of any variety, in that world, no one he loved would die or abandon him, in that world, his family wouldn't hate him….

A sudden feeling of wetness down there, snapped him out of his thoughts and he almost started to panic, because if the blood seeped through his pants and onto the bed sheets, his family might see, they might realize, he couldn't let that happen.

He cautiously sat up, hissing through the bouts of pain that coursed through his sensitive bottom, his still tender ribs and his terribly aching head.

He slowly let his gaze wander down and moved just a little to the side and was relieved to see that there was no blood on the sheets, but the sudden rush of blood that he could feel pour out of him now that he was sitting could change that, so he carefully got out of bed and waddled to the restroom with his thighs clamped shut as tightly as he could get them in hopes that he wouldn't start trailing blood through the cabin.

Once he made it to the bathroom he took a deep gulping breath, partly out of relief that he had made it without bleeding everywhere and partly out of fear because he didn't know what to do if the bleeding had gotten worse.

When he saw how soaked the toilet paper was this time, he almost gave in right then, he was ready to go bang on his father's bedroom door, beg for mercy and declare the immediate need to go to a hospital. There was, wanting, to die and there was, wanting, to have at least a merciful death after having lived through such hell and he wanted the mercy of painkillers and not bleeding to death from rips in his intestines, he didn't care how weak that made him.

Or, maybe he didn't care how he died so long as it's the kind of death he actually CHOSE for himself. Maybe he just wanted to have control over his own death, because he damn sure had no control over his own life…

And he really didn't want to die like this…

But he couldn't tell. He couldn't tell. He couldn't tell. Not when it could get his big brother into trouble with their father, not when it could get their father into trouble with the law, not when it could ruin the lives of everyone around him. Not when it could rip his family apart and hurt the only person he loved more than anything in the entire world.

He couldn't tell.

So, he did the only thing he could do. He dried the blood from the seat and crotch of his underwear as best he could, thanked whoever was upstairs in the prayer department that the blood hadn't gotten through to his sweatpants, then stuffed more toilet paper into his underwear and hoped no one would start questioning why a full roll of toilet paper was disappearing so fast.

The cabin was quiet, the coolness of the predawn hours finally bringing some relief from the heat. The thirteen year old Sam quietly grabbed his pillow and a thin blanket from his bed and went into the living room and stretched out on the sofa with his back propped up at an angle against one of the arms.

And if anyone asked him why he was laying in here instead of his bed, well, he had a good excuse, it's hard to breathe right while lying flat with cracked and bruised ribs. In fact he's pretty sure that he'd read somewhere that a person with cracked and/or bruised ribs isn't supposed to lay flat, but in a reclined position like he was right now or they could wind up with pneumonia or some other sort of serious health issues.

He managed to doze lightly for the next hour and a half until his father came trudging through the living room on his way to the kitchen to put on a pot of coffee and gave cranky grumbles of "Why the hell you in here on the couch?", "What, your bed not good enough for you all the sudden?", "Gonna tattle to your teachers about the crappy bed your dad makes you sleep in?"

"I had to sleep in here." The thirteen year old replied with equal amounts of crankiness "My ribs were making it hard to lay flat."

"Oh, your ribs." His father had stated with venomous sarcasm "Well, imagine how they wouldn't be hurting right now if you had been fast enough to keep that hag from grabbing you. Maybe then you'll finally learn your lesson and start losing some weight."

Just then the seventeen year old Dean traipsed into the living room with a wild look in his eyes and John Winchester suddenly went warily quiet like he was worried that his eldest son might have overheard how cruel he had sounded.

But the second the older boy saw that his kid brother was in the living room the seventeen year old calmed down. Turned out, big brother didn't like it when he woke up and little brother was out of sight and he didn't automatically know where the kid was.

The seventeen year old gave his kid brother a confused look "Why'd you sleep in here? Dude, I know my snoring's not that bad."

"His ribs were making it hard to lay flat." His father stated almost mockingly, as if the thirteen year old were somehow mute, and invisible and couldn't answer questions for himself… What was it that his father was always saying about him needing to learn to grow up?... Well, maybe the man needed to not only practice what he preached and grow the hell up, but maybe he also needed to let the thirteen year old actually do some of that 'growing up' that he was constantly demanding and let the kid answer questions that were directed at him, for himself!

The seventeen year old had instantly gone to his kid brother's side and was already unwrapping the child's ribs, hissing in sympathy as the bruises came into view "Yeah, they still look pretty bad, alright. I'm gonna need some more towels to rewrap him, these are dried out."

"I picked up enough towels from the office to do three different wrappings, last night, the others should be in the hall closet along with the bucket I used to soak the first set in." Their father replied.

After letting another set of towels soak in some apple cider vinegar for about ten minutes, the seventeen year old Dean wrapped his kid brother's ribs tight enough for the wrapping to feel secure, but not so tight that the child would have as much trouble breathing as he had when their father had done it, and the younger boy took note that his big brother's touch was more than gentle, it was reverent, like he actually appreciated that the thirteen year old Sam was still here to take care of and there was definitely affection there. Maybe he hadn't completely lost his big brother's love after all?... Maybe, he was beginning to hope that Dean wouldn't want to lose him or his love either… And maybe he was starting to rethink the whole dying thing, especially since it as stating to look like it might hurt his big brother if he were to suddenly be gone.

"You're right, Sam. It would hurt so damn bad if you were suddenly gone and I didn't know where you were and I had no way to get you back." Present day Dean whispered as he began to have just an inkling of an idea of how Sam might have felt when he and Cass were pulled into Purgatory. "Please, Sammy, I know you gotta be thinkin I don't love ya, but that's not the case, kiddo, it's never gonna be the case and I need you to live so I can spend the rest of my life showing you just how sorry I am for all the crap I've put you through." he was practically babbling as he took two hurried steps to try to reach through whatever veil there was to get to the thirteen year old Sam, because that Sam IS his Sam, that kid somehow managed to grow up to be the Present day Sam he thought he had known everything about, and would always love, no matter how angry he sometimes thought he had a right to be at his kid brother, he'd never stop loving him and he needed for Sam to know that, without even a shadow of a doubt. But Angie tugged him back and gave a pointed look at their joined hands, reminding him that he couldn't do anything for Sam, right now, except watch the things he needed to see from Sam's memories and try to learn every lesson those memories had to teach.

"There ya go, kiddo." The seventeen year old Dean stated sounding almost fond of his little brother as he fixed the pillow behind the kid's back and made sure he was comfortable.

But then the spell was broken as their father grumbled something about 'coddling' and the seventeen year old Dean's whole demeanor changed in an instant, his emotions becoming hidden behind the walls coming up, his affection disappearing behind his usual mask.

The thirteen year old quietly mourned the loss and just as silently cursed his father.

He couldn't really move around too much, or else the apple cider vinegar wouldn't be able to do it's job, so the thirteen year old spent the day either in the bathroom taking care of the bleeding, on the couch trying to rest or at the kitchen table cleaning weapons because he had gotten tired of hearing his father's underhanded ways of insinuating that he was 'lazy; and 'good for nothing'. And when the day ended both his father and brother never even noticed that he had only drank a half glass of water and still hadn't eaten anything the entire day.

"I was a real piece of work, back then, wasn't I, Sammy?" Present day Dean asked his kid brother as the scene greyed out, because he believed that Sam, the Sam of NOW, could somehow hear him.

The thirteen year old Sam's next day had started out no different than the previous one, he woke up earlier than everyone else because of how the evil, brightly painted monsters had once again found and caught him and hurt him, again, last night while he had been desperately seeking some restful slumber.

And no matter how hard he had tried he couldn't convince himself that it was just nightmares, because it always felt too real…. It had been real. It had really happened. And until he was sure the bad men had been locked away they would always have that power over him. He wanted, needed to take that power back.

He got the chance later that day when his father ordered the seventeen year old Dean to take him to the library two towns over because he needed research done as he'd been called to consult on a hunt for one of Caleb's contacts.

His father had then practically sneered at him as he asked if he thought he could keep his shirt from riding up while he was at the library because he couldn't afford to move them again for a while, which the boy knew was total B.S., if John Winchester wanted to move, he didn't let things like affordability stand in the way. The boy honestly didn't doubt that the man already had plans to have them moved to someplace else by the end of the week he was so used to being hauled from state to state, from new school to new school, with sometimes only as little as a day between moves. He can still remember the two different times he had been enrolled in a new school only to be pulled out by the end of that same day and enrolled into a different new school in another state the very next day, so he wouldn't put it past his father to have them moved within the next ten hours if that's what suited HIM and his obsessive drive for the continuous pursuit of 'saving people and hunting things'…

The boy had given a timid "Yes, Sir." in response to his father's question then the second he had walked out the door to go out to the Impala he had rolled his eyes in disbelief at just how deep his father's B.S. could get and how the man sometimes even seemed to buy his own crap at times.; It was annoying how a man could lie so much he could begin to actually convince even himself that he really did have an honest bone in his body.

The nearest library had been sixty miles away, so when they got there, the seventeen year old Dean was frustrated with the drive through the desert heat and was not going to spend his time in town doing research, that was 'geek boy's job' according to the older brother, he had found a better way to pass the time and the thirteen year old had rolled his eyes again. This time at the way his big brother went chasing after a pretty blonde in Daisy Duke shorts the second he had laid eyes on her.

The thirteen year old was just fine with doing the research by himself, it would give him plenty of opportunity to use the library's internet for his own purposes while he was at it.

He got the librarian to give him a 'guest card' which would serve as his way to use the computers as he didn't have a library card for this town, (Had to have proof of a permanent physical address, not a P.O. Box, to get a library card, so he'd be S.O.L. on checking out any books unless their father had given his big brother the rent receipt from when he paid for two weeks at the cabin.).

He would only get an hour on the computer, so he would have to use his time wisely.

The first thing he looked up was any kind of news he could find for the last three days in Tampa, Florida because he needed to assuage his guilt ridden mind with some kind of reassurance that he had done the right thing. He had no idea what he would do if he found out that nothing had been done about his 'tip' to the law enforcement there.

Relief, flooded through him as he saw the proof in black and white, that he had made a difference. Two men who had worked at a "Plucky Penniwhistle's Magical Menagerie." as the clowns "Cosmo" and "Zany" had been arrested for charges of Pedophilia, Kidnapping, Sexual Assault, Aggravated Assault and Murder. And that Dwight Russel a.k.a. "Zany the clown" had offered up a full confession, told where the bodies of their victims were buried, where to find the 'trophies' they had taken from their victims and what the 'trophies' were then he had basically thrown his friend Lonnie 'Cosmo the clown' Callahand, under the bus for a Plea Bargain of twenty years in prison instead of a life or death sentence if he testified against Callahand and the prosecution was already feeling secure that they had enough evidence to put Callahand away for life or maybe even get the man the death penalty and Dwight Russel's testimony would leave no room for doubts that might cause a hung jury. The article had gone on to say that they were searching for the men's only surviving victim, saying that Dwight Russel had confessed that only hours before the 'anonymous tip' that led officials to the alleged criminals had been called in that he and Lonnie Callahand had raped a child and that when Lonnie had gone to kill the boy, the boy had fought back and escaped, the article gave a description of the child and said that officials were searching state wide and that if anyone saw a boy fitting the description to please call police as there was already speculation that the surviving victim had been the one to call in the tip and that the child may be scared to come forward, for fear of getting into trouble for stabbing his alleged assailant when he fought back.

He was crying as he finished reading the article and without even knowing why, he hit "Print" and printed the article out and folded the paper and stuffed it into the side pocket of his jeans. This had been his first real solo fight against monsters and maybe he needed it to prove to himself that he could be a good hunter too, even if his methods of getting 'the job' done were different from his father's.

There was still plenty of time left to do the research his father needed for the hunt he was consulting Caleb's contact on

When he left the library with all of his research in tow to meet his big brother out in the Impala, he was feeling better than he had in a while.

The bad men were being punished, and yeah, the thirteen year old Sam thought that the guy getting a lighter sentence due to a Plea Bargain was getting off too easy, but the chances of him surviving the full twenty years in prison, were slim. From what the thirteen year old knew about the system, people who hurt kids never lasted long in jail, so twenty years in prison for a Pedophile was just as good as a death sentence (Which he was pretty sure that the prosecution had "accidently forgotten" to mention THAT little fact to Dwight Russel when offering the Plea Bargain.)… So, knowing that, (Hoping for that), was going to have to be enough.

An hour later the seventeen year old Dean had been sent to get some grub from the gas station/diner about six miles from their cabin and the thirteen year old Sam was standing in their cabin's kitchen, piling all of his research on top of the table while his father looked at each piece of paper he had either printed out off the internet or copied from some of the library books, with a look of severe scrutiny and the thirteen year old knew that it was because his father was trying to find some kind of flaw with the work he had done on a project that should have been his father's to work on.

His father picked through each of the notes that the thirteen year old had already written down while he was waiting on the library and seemed dissatisfied with the child's notes on how to kill a Chupacabra, which was what Caleb's contact was hunting for and need a consultation on how to kill because apparently that type of monster was so rare that no currently living hunter had even ever seen real evidence that that species of monsters were real or weren't extinct until a few days ago when not only had one been sighted but it had also killed a child.

"Your notes say that a hunt for a Chupacabra needs at least five well experienced hunters participating to be successful." The thirteen year old's father stated it like he was expecting some elaboration, from his son, when he had all of the elaboration he needed in the notes in front of him.

"Yes, Sir." The boy replied dutifully "It's because to kill one, it's arms, legs and head all have to be severed from it's body at exactly the same time, then all of the severed parts have to be put on five different wooden stakes, the arms have to be staked into the ground with the left arm in the South-East corner and the right arm in the North-West corner, and both arms have to be exactly thirty paces away, from where the torso fell, the legs have to be staked into the ground with the left leg in the North-East corner and the right leg in the South-West corner and also exactly thirty paces away from where the torso fell and the head has to be staked face down right into the center of the back of it's body all at once, then all of it's body parts must be lit on fire and it all has to be done exactly at the same time within ten minutes from the creature's body hitting the ground. I also wrote in my notes that it would be best to take the creature down in a field so that once it's down the paces can be counted out without a tree getting in the way."

John Winchester had sat there giving a frustrated shake of his head as he listened to his son explain what the research had led him to believe was the only way to actually kill a Chupacabra and keep it dead. "You just love to make things complicated, don't you?"

The thirteen year old grabbed one of the stapled together stacks of paper from the table and flipped it open to some of the different legends on the lore of the Chupacabra, then he highlighted why it was feesable that the thing could not really be killed any other way than he had theorized. Apparently the race of Chupacabra were able to regrow appendages that were severed and the severed appendages were able to grow new bodies, meaning, that to behead the beast would mean making at least a whole nother, Chupacabra to fight, to shoot the beast would be pointless no matter what sort of bullet was used because it's injuries could apparently heal themselves and to try just burning the beast could be disastrous because of it's fire proof skin that's only vulnerable to fire if all appendages have been severed at once, and since each piece of the beast's body takes ten minutes to start regenerating, if a team of at least five well-experienced hunters worked in synchronized tandem, then it was possible for the beast to be successfully vanquished so long as every part of it was burned to ash before it could regain it's fire proof skin and the reason why the appendage placement was important was because it was feasible to theorize that the Chupacabra's brain organized the regeneration progress until each appendage had grown a body with a brain of it's own, and it was a reasonable assumption that if the thing couldn't find exactly where all of it's appendages had been staked down then it might end up growing the wrong body parts or growing parts backwards, making each new copy malformed and thus easier to kill if something should go wrong with the first attempt.

The child showed his father all of the research he had done that supported his theory and how certain lores like the staking a vampire in the heart myth and the tales of the beasts known as the 'Hydra Tierra' and "Terra Asterias" had most likely come from possible accounts of attempts to kill a Chupacabra.

"You expect me to send five of some of the best hunters out there into this thing basically blind because of YOUR theories and assumptions?!, If you're gonna be any use as a hunter you need to learn that you can't send good, hunters with more value than you'll ever have out to possibly die because of some fantastical whimsy that you've based your theories on!' The child's father growled as he held up one of the many printed out and copied sections of papers on the lore of certain Mythical and Legendary Creatures, rolled it up and smacked the thirteen year old Sam on top of his head like he was scolding a dog as he continued to berate the child with. "This crap, is fiction, Sam."

"And yet…" The thirteen year old bit out as he grabbed sections of the papers he had printed and copied out "Wendigos." he tossed a section back onto the table, "Selkies." another section was tossed back onto the table, "Kelpies.", "Black Dogs.", "Skin Walkers.", "Shapeshifters.", "Werewolves.", "Witches." "Ghosts.", "Manananggals." each word was punctuated with a toss of a section of paper back onto the table and the word 'Manananggals.' had gotten an especially loud and venomous punctuation before the child continued with a harsh growl of "And Cupacabras are all real and you use books like the ones these papers came from, almost every hunt, to try and figure out how to beat the monster you're hunting."

"Don't get smart with me, boy." The child's father growled and the boy would have normally stopped pushing, but he was hurting, he was bleeding, he was dying and it was all too much and he was so tired of always being such a coward. His father had pushed him and now he was too far past the point of no return to put on the brakes and tuck tail and run from this argument right now.

"No, of course not, Sir." The child said with a snarled vehemence that could have had grown men (who weren't John Winchester) cowering at the venom and LOATHING in the child's icy and uncaringly hollow tone "Can't have ME getting smart now can we, Sir?"

The look in John Winchester's eyes became stormy with anger as he grabbed the thirteen year old Sam by the front of his shirt and lifted him off his feet then pinned him to the kitchen wall and growled "You will never talk to me like that again, you snot nosed little brat."

Then the man was throwing his son towards the kitchen table where the thirteen year old stumbled and ended up laying bent in half at the waist over the table.

Present day Dean was trying to tug free from Angie's grasp again as he started cursing his father and threatening to rip the man apart with his bare hands as he watched through the terrified thirteen year old Sam's eyes as the man started undoing his belt.

The force at which the child was tossed and the jolt of the impact of his abdomen against the edge of the table must have done something, bad, because the boy could feel something inside of him ripping lose and he could feel spurts of blood pouring from his torn channel as a firey pain cut though his lower abdomen.

He knew the blood would be seeping through his pants soon and that nothing he could do would stop it and the pain, it was too intense to keep his sounds of anguish bit back and he was wailing in earnest, but his father wasn't going to show him any mercy. It was when he heard the belt sliding through his father's denim loops, confirming that he was about to get one hell of a beating and the command to drop his jeans and underwear, confirming that he'd have to take that beating with a shamefully bared and bleeding rear, that he lost it and flipped out.

The next thing he knew he was on the floor, curled in a ball, screaming that the bad clowns had killed him and 'Please don't hit me daddy!" and he was screaming and babbling but somehow his father must have made sense of at least some of his ramblings because the man went pale and was gathering the violently quivering thirteen year old child into his arms and carrying him out the cabin's front door and towards his truck.

As the scene went gray Present day Dean knew that the thirteen year old Sam had been in so much pain that he must have lost consciousness and he could remember his father's lies of Sam having a sudden and severe bout of appendicitis, which was why he and Sam had disappeared so suddenly as there had been no time for writing a note once he realized why Sam had suddenly doubled over in while screaming about a pain in his right side, he could remember his dad lying and saying that the doctor had given Sam some antibiotics and anti-inflammatory medicines and hadn't had to go as far as removing Sam's appendix which would later serve for the excuse as to why there was no scar from an appendectomy, but would also be enough of an excuse to keep from enrolling Sam in school for five more days. And he could remember how he had blindly fallen for it, even mentioning that the thirteen year old Sam "Did have a fever the other day." how he had asked "Do ya think that might've been what was wrong with him then?" and how his father had made him feel all kinds of guilty when he had answered "Probably. You should have told me about him running a fever, the second you noticed it, Dean."

He could also remember how that, later down the road, that guilt had turned into resentment again, and how that resentment had caused him to say and do some pretty mean and crappy things to his kid brother and he knew that he had so many things to make up for.

When Angie pulled him back to her side he could hardly see from all of the tears blurring his vision.

Sounds were still muted and the grey blanket of unconsciousness still clung to him, but he could make out the angry cadence of his father's voice even if he couldn't understand due to the thick haze surrounding him and muffling everything.

A hand swept his bangs off of his forehead and he flinched violently at the contact and gave a distressed whimper, because he was hurting, confused, he didn't know where he was and he was so scared. He didn't really understand anything that was happening as he felt the rising and falling and tilting and spinning of the world even when he felt like he was floating far away from it. His stomach rebelled and he felt himself lurch forward, then vile and revolting nastiness was pouring free from him and nothing was solid but everything was heavy. He felt damp, everywhere and he pitched his head from side to side trying to escape the oppressive heat that was roasting him alive. He could see light pouring through his closed eyelids and he whined because it hurt and it was too hot and he could hear murmured voices telling him that it was okay, but he didn't believe them and he turned his head away and sobbed out that he was dying and that the bad clowns had killed him and then he was begging GOD to please just let him die because everything would be better that way and nothing bad could happen because of him anymore and he heard his father's voice telling him that he was so sorry and that he didn't mean to hurt him and then his daddy was begging him, pleading with him not to die and he told his daddy he was sorry that he was fat and weak and a failure and he was sorry for never being good enough and the world was spinning and tilting and he was crying and hurting and hot and everything felt wrong and bad and off and he was floating away from the voices and the feelings and it made him feel scared and sick and then he couldn't hear anything, he couldn't see anything, he couldn't feel anything and he didn't know that death would feel like this. This disjointed sort of tumbling between unconsciousness and awareness and nightmares and good dreams, and a safe place that might be a memory or it might be Heaven and he really wants to stay but an angry man keeps telling him that he's an abomination and that he doesn't deserve the happiness he felt when he heard the soothing voice of a woman singing to him and telling him that angels are watching over him, but the angry man is pushing him away and he can't see her face. All he knows is she has blonde hair and the most beautiful voice he's ever heard besides Dean's. The angry man keeps pushing him back, telling him he doesn't belong here. That he can't have this. That, there are plans for him. That him being here screws everything up. And then he's falling back into the spinning darkness, he's being turned inside out and he can't remember where he was, all he knows is he wants to go back, please let him go back, because it's the only place where he felt like someone might actually love and accept him for him, just the way he is right now, without any conditions, without any resentment, without having to feel obligated to. And it felt safe there. He can't remember where he was, but he knows that it had felt safe there, that he had felt happy there, and he just wants to be safe, to be loved, to get to feel happy, without being a burden, without always being the reason everything bad happens. He wants to go back.

Present day Dean wanted to kill Zachariah all over again as he watched the bastard force Sam from the only true happiness he had felt for at least four years, back then, but at the same time he was grateful because if Zachariah hadn't forced Sam out of Heaven then he would have lost the kid and wouldn't have ever been able to get him back… And he would have remained blind to how Sam had suffered, to what kind of monster their father had been because as far as his seventeen year old self would have known, the thirteen year old would have died due to only some unforeseen complications with the appendicitis that the kid never really had. Because, of course, John Winchester, would have never told him the truth, not when it would have meant selling himself down the river. All that had mattered to that man was remaining blameless in the eyes of anyone who wasn't himself.

When the thirteen year old Sam, blinked open his eyes he was staring straight into a surgical lamp, he knew it was a surgical lamp because he had seen them on T.V. on various shows and movies and he wondered why the light seemed to be shining right in his eyes. And why was there so much heat coming from the light? Why was he so sweaty? Why did his chest hurt? Why did everything hurt? Why was he feeling so nauseas and dizzy? What had happened? Why couldn't he remember what had happened? Where was he? Why was there a machine that seemed to be beeping angrily at him? He was having trouble breathing because there was too much light, too much heat, too much noise and confusion and pain and he felt really sick. Someone was telling him to calm down and they were trying to put something over his mouth and nose and he turned his head away and started to struggle because he didn't like something being that close to his face when he was feeling so weak and so vulnerable and couldn't fight back, the last time someone had put something so close to his face while he was feeling like this the horridly foul tasting thing had been forced down his throat and had made him choke and feel like he was going to be sick and he didn't want anything near his face because a bad man had put something near his face and he hadn't been able to fight back when it forced into his mouth, and it had hurt, like he's afraid the thing being put near his face now, will hurt.

"It's just an oxygen mask, son." A kind voice tells him from somewhere just outside the edge of his graying vision and he stops struggling, because he's so tired and all the will to fight is draining from him and he feels so weak and disoriented that he knows he won't win anyway. They can do anything and everything they want to him in any and every way they want to do it and there's nothing he can do about it. He knows he says something along those lines and the verbal admission has him crying because he knows he's been defeated without having ever really had a chance to fight back, much less win.

A voice tells him that he's safe, that no one's going to hurt him and that nothing bad is going to happen to him. He would swear that it's his father's voice, but his father doesn't sound like that anymore, not when it comes to him.

He opens and closes his mouth, because something about his mouth feels weird. His tongue keeps getting stuck to the roof of his mouth and there's a tangy, coppery, acidic taste in the back of his throat. A cup with a bendy-straw in it magically manifests in front of him and he goes to reach for it, but his arms seem too heavy for him to raise very far.

Someone tells him to take it easy and the cup floats closer to him so that the straw is close enough for him to get the straw between his severely chapped lips, he takes a few desperately rapid drinks like he fears the liquid will vanish before he can get anymore. And he doesn't know or care why but that makes no sense. Someone tells him to go slow or he'll make himself sick. But he was already feeling sick and he just wants to feel better and the liquid seems to be helping him feel a little better. The cup moves away and out of his sight and he makes a sound that tells of his misery and confusion because the cup is gone and he doesn't know if he'll get any more of the liquid. And he really wants more of the liquid and he's breathing out a distressed sound of "Wa… Wa… Wa…" but he doesn't know what he's trying to say, if he's trying to ask 'What?' or 'Why?'

A voice tells him he'll get more water in a few seconds if he can hold the few sips he's taken down. Someone says something about a bad reaction to an anesthetic that he wouldn't have been given if they had known about his head injury. He doesn't know what head injury the voice is talking about, he's used to getting knocked upside the head on practically a weekly basis.

"You don't remember cracking your skull?" Someone asks "Your father said you fell two stories.."

"Oh… Yeah…" His speech slurs and he thinks he sounds high "A pissed off, man eating spirit of a dead witch dropped me from way, WAAYY UPPP!" his word echoed inside of the oxygen mask and caused a tickling sensation against his lips and the tip of his nose and he tried to swat the mask away again and gave a whine when someone pulled his hand away.

A few seconds too late to stop the runaway train of his mouth he realizes that there's reasons why he can't just blurt things like that out to people he doesn't know. But there's a part of him that couldn't really be bothered to give a damn about the mistake he just made.

"You gotta leave it on, Sam, it's helping you breathe." The kind voice from before, gently admonishes him then asks "You took a twelve year old on a hunt for a Manananggal when you should have known that they most commonly prey on children?" and he hears his father (and he KNOWS it's his father because the voice is angry and belligerent) answer "I cut off her head… And I thought there was no way the bitch could survive that, so I told Dean to get Sam and meet me out in the woods so they could keep watch while I burned her body."

"Yet if you had actually done any research you would have known that the word Manananggal means 'One who separates itself.' and that they can't be killed unless they're separated from their lower halves and can't get reattached before the sun rises. And If you had researched it yourself, you would have found out that the only way to keep them from being able to reattach themselves to their lower halves, once they've separated from their lower halves, is to saturate their lower halves with salt and holy water. What the hell were you thinking, involving a twelve year old in a hunt for something like that, especially when YOU clearly hadn't done any research?"

"If Sam had gotten the info to me sooner, the bitch would have never had a chance to get near him." The child heard his father growl. The boy whimpered "I'm sorry, you only gave me less than an hour to do the research and when I tried to tell you the only way to kill her, that I could find, you hung up on me."

"That's not an excuse, Sam, you could have…"

"If you finish that sentence, Winchester, I'm tossing you out of this room. And you might want to keep in mind that we're on the fifth floor, because I seriously doubt I'll be using the door if you catch my meaning."

"I catch your meaning just fine, doc." John Winchester huffed.

"I cannot believe that you were seriously just about to blame a twelve year old for your screw up!" The other voice whispered angrily.

"Thirteen." The child whispered, because he didn't want to hear the voices being so angry anymore and it was the only thing he could think to say at the moment. And it worked because both voices shut up, but now he's wishing he had just kept his mouth shut because he knows that someone is going to say something and then the angry voices will start again and he's so tired of people always being mad because of him.

"Thirteen?" The kind voice that he still didn't recognize yet, asked.

"My birthday was the second." He replied solemnly.

"Good, lord." The kind voice was frustrated "You can't even keep track of how old your own child is?! How in the hell am I supposed to put together an accurate medical history when my patient's own father apparently doesn't know anything about him?"

"I…" John Winchester tried to start…

"Do you realize that your son's life is on the line here?, You saw how close you just came to losing him…Do you even care that if you can't give me an accurately detailed medical history on him then the next time his heart stops, I might not be able to get it beating again because I might not be able to give him the right treatment? I need to know about every single broken bone he's ever had, every fracture, every pulled muscle, every concussion, hell, at this point, I want to know about every time he's ever fallen, had a headache, fever or even just a scratch, because I'm seriously starting to think you haven't been taking him to at least some kind of doctor any of the other times when he might have been either hurt or sick."

"Uh…" The child's father was about to start listing off excuses.

"Oh, hell, John… Really?!... You've seriously been stitching his wounds and setting his broken bones on your own, in hotel rooms, haven't you?!"

"You had better be so glad that I can't report your ass without risking getting sent away too. You should know better than that crap! Working on a child is a completely different ball game from working on an adult. You cannot rely on quick stitches and homemade casts when dealing with a kid Sam's age! People have to have medical licenses to practice medicine for a reason, and it takes a lot of extra work for a doctor to get licensed for pediatric medicine, for a reason. Because being a doctor takes a lot of knowledge, a lot of practice, the proper techniques and equipment, and a sure and steady hand along with a professional bed side manner and to be a pediatric doctor takes lots of EXTRA knowledge, lots of EXTRA practice because children require different techniques, different medicines and dosages, they require different care because their bodies aren't fully grown yet. Are you understanding, anything that I'm trying to tell you, here, John?!"

"Yeah… Sam, needs to learn how to stop getting hurt so much." The child's father mumbled under his breath and the child wanted to say "What was it you told ME about mumbling crap under my breath? What?… Suddenly you don't have enough spine to say what you wanna say loud and clear?", but the child just let his head roll to the side and looked at the doctor as if to say "See what I've gotta deal with?"

"Okay… I think it's time you leave the room." The doctor commanded.

"But…" The child's father started to argue.

"Now, John and you best stay out if you know what's good for you. Because, that window is starting to look really appealing. And I doubt you want to keep tempting me."

The child's father disappeared out the door and the doctor moved closer to the thirteen year old, who shrank back, despite how kind the man had sounded, he was still a stranger and he didn't like being alone in a room with a stranger, especially, after what happened the last time he was alone with in a room with strangers.

"Sorry about that, Sam." The doctor sounded genuinely apologetic "I had to make him leave because he was upsetting you."

"I wasn't.."

"Your heart rate, can't lie, Sam." The doctor replied as he pointed at the monitor next to the other side of the bed Sam was laying in. "And I really did not wanna have to use the defibrillator on you again."

"Did, my heart really stop?" The child asked.

"You heard that, huh?"

The child nodded and gave a shrug.

"Yeah." The doctor stated solemnly "Yeah, it really stopped."

"Does that mean I died?"

"Well technically, Time of Death can't be called unless a person's heart stops beating for a full seven minutes and even then, people are sometimes brought back, even after twenty minutes, if they have a doctor who will keep trying to get their heart beat back."

"How long did my heart stop beating for?"

"Fifteen minutes."

"So, I was technically dead, for eight minutes…" It was a statement, not a question this time.

"Kinda."

"Why didn't you just let me stay dead?" The child asked with a sob.

"Sam, the monitor registering your brain kept picking up activity, it meant you were in there fighting to live."

"Actually I think I was really in here begging for you to please just let me die. Except I think my spirit kept getting thrown back into my body every time it tried to leave again.."

"Because it wasn't your time, Sam."

"Or maybe because I'm so worthless that even Hell doesn't want me."

"Sam…"

"Just forget it… I need to know what all my father knows… What did he tell you and most importantly, what did you tell him?"

"Is this about what caused all of the internal bleeding that I had to stop earlier?"

The boy nodded again then he whispered "So… What all does he know?.. About…" he made a gesture towards his lower half "You know?..."

"Honestly, I think he probably guessed close enough to be right at least about some of it before he even brought you in and I couldn't really tell him anything more than he was already assuming at that point…"

"Which, was?..."

"He said you were feverish and incoherent and that you were babbling about evil clowns hurting you, killing you. Then he noticed the blood seeping through the back of your pants and automatically assumed that you had somehow been sexually assaulted. But he couldn't quite piece together how evil clowns fit into all the things you were feverishly rambling about, until he found that piece of paper that, was in the front pocket of your pants."

"So, you both know just about everything…" The child stated numbly as he gave a frustrated shake of his head. He was about to fall apart.

"No… I don't know everything, and I really do need to know everything, so I can help you."

"I don't want anyone to help me." The child whispered "I just want it all to be over. Can't you just give me something that will make it all be over and then you could just maybe tell my father that my heart stopped again and that you couldn't?..."

"No, Sam… He's not going to do that." It was his father's voice and he curled into himself "Sam?.." The man's voice sounded disbelieving, like he just couldn't believe that he had been missing something so important, that had been right under his nose for such a long time.

The child was rocking back and forth muttering "Please, please, please, please, just let me die." and his body was quaking and quivering with violent tremors as all of his fear and his pain started pouring out and he began to unravel.

"I thought I told you to stay out of the room." The doctor growled as he stepped between John and his son.

"Well, then I guess I don't know what's good for me, and by the way your office has paper thin walls." John Winchester stated callously as he effortlessly stepped around the doctor and gathered his sobbing child, who was still pleading to die, against his chest "You're not worthless, Sammy. I was so wrong to ever say that kind of crap to you. I just… I don't know how to be a good dad, but I can promise to start trying harder…"

"Really?" The child asked in tearful disbelief that was warily edged with a glimmer of hope, as he tried to burrow further into the comfort of his father's embrace.

"Yeah… Yeah, kiddo. I promise. But you have to promise me some things too, okay?"

The child gave a violent shudder because he couldn't promise anything. He had nothing to give, expect his best effort, and that was never going to be good enough, all he ever did was fail, all he'd ever do is fail. He'd never be good enough, he'd never be worth enough. All he was, all he'd ever be, is a failure. A big, fat, weak, pathetic, failure.

He must have said some of that stuff out loud because his father squeezed him tighter and whispered "No, Sammy, I was wrong. I was wrong."

After a few seconds his father relinquished his hold on him and said "You just have to promise to tell me and Doctor Robert here everything we need to know so we can both figure out how to help you. Can you do that, kiddo?"

The boy gave a nod, and breathed a sigh of relief, but the occasional sob still escaped him and the occasional tremor still shook his small frame.

"Okay… Doctor Robert's gonna ask you a few questions now. Just answer him as best you can."

"Yes, Sir." The child replied dutifully.

About a dauntingly trying hour filled with sobbing, heartache, actual physical pain and a few omitted details later, the thirteen year old was finally too exhausted to continue all the way up to the point where he had collapsed in the kitchen floor right before his father had brought him here, but he had already said enough… Enough for Doc Roberts to make a correct guess about some of those omitted details, which was enough to give Doctor Robert a clear picture of the young Sam's home life…. And, it was enough to make John Winchester look like he finally realized just how much of a bastard he really was.

John had tried with excuses of not having any possible way of knowing what had happened to Sam before that afternoon. And Doctor Robert had tossed the paper that Sam had printed out at the library and shouted "Well maybe if you had answered your phone that night when your son needed you the most!.. Or how about if did your own research and actually started paying attention to more sections of the newspapers than the obituaries, you might have found at least one clue?!" And with that, Doctor Robert had tossed two different local newspapers that was running articles on the "Nightmares at Plucky's", then the man turned on the news where it became apparent that two pedophiles working as clowns in a restaurant for kids was making news on a national level. Except the restaurant's high priced lawyers and probably a few well-placed bribes were keeping it from becoming major headlines. Someone wanted to keep the story as quiet as possible and also make it go away as fast as possible. Of, course that's probably because it would have been bad for business if people across the country started actually thinking twice about how safe the dining establishments they took their children to and allowed their children to go to with friends, were.

Upon hearing the doctor yell about how the rape was on the news and in nation-wide newspapers , the child's breath hitched and he whispered "I'm sorry. I didn't mean to cause so much trouble. I just didn't know what else to do…" Then his breathing became labored and panicked as he sobbed out "One of the bad men took a picture of me, what if the cops go to my old school and find out who I am and…"

"Their not going to find you, Sam." His father whispered reassuringly. "I'm going to take care of everything…."

The child felt sick, because if this was nation-wide news then any cop, any teacher, anyone who watched the news might see him and realize he fits the description of the evil clowns' only surviving rape victim and then all the lies he had told to get them out of Florida would be for nothing.

He must have babbled some of his frightening thoughts out loud, again, because his father was rocking with him, telling him that everything was going to be fine, that no one was going to take him away, no one was going to break up their family… and in those soothing words he finally said what Sam had been needing to hear "You did the right thing, son, you were so brave, I'm so proud of you."

And for a small moment in time, the child felt like his daddy loved him and he was starting to believe that his daddy really was going to try to be a better dad.

But then his father sad the words that made all those warm feelings, stop dead in their tracks. "Me and Dean'll take care of everything."

"NO!" The thirteen year old shrieked as he pushed away from his father "Dean can't ever know!" he growled at the man. "You have to swear to me that you will never tell him and that you'll do everything you can to make sure he never finds out!", then his breathing became erratic "Oh god, what if Dean watches the news?! He can't know, he can't ever know. Please, don't let him find out! Don't let him find out!, Don't let him find out.. Don't let him find out.."

He couldn't stop pleading in a panicked chant, no matter how his father tried to calm him down and after hearing the machines beeping frantically Doctor Robert was suddenly there, pushing a syringe into his forearm, then everything started quickly fading to gray and the last thing he heard were his own pleading cries of "Don't let Dean find out.", his father's scared and angry bellow of "What the hell did you just do to my son!" and Doctor Robert shouting back "I had no choice but to sedate him before he sent himself into another cardiac arrest, John!"

He had no idea how long he was out for. He only knew that the inside of his mouth felt like it was coated with cotton and his chest felt tight and achy.

"Hey, kiddo." His father whispered as he noticed the child was awake. "Ya thirsty?", he asked as he brought a cup of water with a straw close enough for Sam to have a sip.

The boy was aware enough this time to know not to drink to quickly so he took a few slow sips and pulled back with a tired sigh once he was finished and whispered "What happened?.. Why does my chest hurt so bad?"

His father paled and was seemingly speechless, Doctor Robert's voice was the one who answered him "You had a really bad panic attack, Sam and we couldn't get you to calm down fast enough before it triggered your heart to start beating too erratically… You went into to something called 'A-Fib' it means that all the muscles in your heart weren't beating in sync like they're supposed to, and the 'A-Fib' caused one of your heart muscles to give out… Then your heart stopped beating at all, again…"

"How long this time?" The child asked shakily.

"Ten minutes." The doctor replied.

"So, I died, again?" The child cried "Why did you bring me back? I don't want to be back.."

"Sam.." His father's scream roughened voice choked out and it was clear from the man's red rimmed and exhausted eyes that he had been crying. "Please.", the man begged, "I didn't wanna lose you…"

The child gave his father a disbelieving look and finally tumbled past the edges of his already fraying sanity as he went off like a nuclear bomb and started laying waste to his father with venomously hateful words "You didn't wanna lose me?!", he shouted indignantly, the machine beside him beeped angrily and the doctor was going for another syringe. "You hit me!, You call me worthless!, You call me, slow, weak, selfish, fat and always say I'm such a failure! You're always telling me that I don't matter that anything I feel, anything I want or need and that everything that I care about, doesn't MATTER! That my LIFE, doesn't matter! My drama doesn't matter! You act like you think I'm stupid and you treat me like I'm nothing!"

"You already lost me, a long time ago." he sobbed as Doctor Robert injected him with yet another sedative. He heard Doctor Robert say "John, maybe you should leave the room for a while." And he heard his father crying, but he couldn't make himself think to give a damn. He hoped the man was hurting just as bad as him.

He woke up feeling physically sore and achy, but emotionally he felt… Numb.

The doctor was quiet as he edged closer and adjusted the bed so that now Sam was sitting up in a reclined position. Then the doctor wrapped a warmed blanket around him and gave him a sad smile, but he still hadn't said a word.

"Is my dad still around?" The question sounded accusatory, like he didn't expect anything else from his father other than for him to have fled to some new hunt to avoid the issues at hand, as he snapped it out with a hate sharpened edge.

"He's just outside in the hall." The doctor replied "I sent him out… Told him to take a walk around the block. To do something, anything besides sit outside the door and mope.. And he did… He stayed gone for about an hour and a half… Then he came back and begged me to let him back in here to sit by you. But I told him that it'd be up to you and whether or not you wanted him in here after you woke up."

The child shook his head "I don't want to see him.", he whispered, like he was afraid it was the wrong thing to say "If… If that's okay, with you.."

"It's perfectly okay with me." The doctor sounded smug "He deserved everything you said to him and more, Sam.", As he got closer the thirteen year old could see that the doctor's eyes were shining with unfallen tears. "If you… Uh… If you don't want… Uh.. If you don't want to go back home with him, Sam… All you have to do is tell me… I can call Bobby, Pastor Jim, Caleb… Anyone you want…"

"What about Dean?"

"Dean could go with you… Wherever you wanna go. Just say the word Sam."

"But then, Dean will know… I don't want him to know… I don't want him to know about any of it.."

"Why, Sam… He's your brother.."

"Please.." The child cried "He can't ever know… He'll think what happened to me was his fault and it wasn't.. "

"Okay, Sam… Okay.. But that doesn't mean you and Dean have to stay with your dad…"

"No… Dean can't know about dad hitting me either.." He said with a determined vehemence. "Dean… He loves dad… Dad's his hero and I don't want to be the one to destroy his hero. I don't wanna be the reason, Dean starts hating dad… And…" his voice dropped to a hushed and fearful whisper "If Dean found out about dad hitting me, he might kill him and I don't want Dean to wind up hating me for being the reason he ended up hating or maybe even killing his own dad."

"Oh, Sam… There's ways to…"

"No." The child stated firmly "If Dean will have to know anything about what happened or about what dad, did… Then, no… I won't be the reason Dean loses his dad."

"He's your dad, too, Sam."

"No… He's my father. But he's never been my dad… Not really. Dean's the only real dad I've ever known." They both ignored the mournful wail, filled with regret and sorrow that came from the hall… Paper thin walls indeed.

Doctor Robert spent about an hour talking to Sam, and giving him the respect that an intelligent and well behaved child, like Sam clearly deserved, but there had obviously been an ulterior motive… The doctor had been subtly figuring out other things about the boy in his care, like how the boy had suffered chest pains during several different 'Training Sessions', how often the child went days without food and even water for fear of gaining weight or simply because he had been too nauseas after what had happened to eat or drink anything, how the small amount of sleep the boy did get had been filled with nightmares almost every night for years and now that he had been attacked in the most brutal way, the nightmares had gotten worse and more vividly centered around the rape and how he had managed the rectal bleeding and was able to keep it hidden for four days, especially since a one of those days had been spent traveling across the country. The doctor had been careful as he edged the conversation towards how often John drank and just what sorts of 'punishments' the man doled out on his youngest child before finding out about how only five days ago John had slapped Sam in the face when the boy had once again tried to tell about the rape, which was sadly, the only hit the child would consider as actual abuse.

Throughout the conversation, the thirteen year old Sam had been so guarded, that it had taken a lot of coaxing and several reassurances that the information was needed for making an accurate medical record so that John could start taking him to an actual doctor from now on without certain questions being raised about all of the obvious past injuries he had sustained. The doctor told the boy that he needed to know the real source behind every injury, every illness so that he could figure out what could be written in his medical records that wouldn't attract suspicion.

As Sam had warily told the good doctor, pretty much every detail of his life from the time he was around eight years old, the doctor had stayed calm and collective through hearing about how Sam had been left alone for a week with no money and hardly any food when he was only eleven. But Present day Dean could see the quiet storm of fury brewing in the man's eyes and knew that Doctor Robert was probably going to be dealing some firey retribution out to one John Winchester later when Sam wouldn't be able to see or hear how his father was verbally, maybe even physically torn into.

Hearing about five years of Sam's life, from Sam's own mouth had made it so much worse… Even with all of the details that Present day Dean knew that the kid had been omitting, Sam's life, sounded like it had turned into a veritable Hell the second John Winchester had laid into him with that first undeserved spanking and had only spiraled downwards from there… And really… How could something go lower, or be worse, than even Hell?

Finally Doctor Robert honed in on the more serious subject of the young Sam's state of mind, asking tentative questions about how he viewed himself despite some of the obvious answers he had gotten earlier when Sam had muttered about being fat, worthless, weak, slow, a failure… And eventually the man had pried out the answer of how Sam had come to obtain scaring over cuts on his hips along with an answer to how many times Sam had thought about suicide. Finally telling the doctor everything he needed to know so he could give Sam the help he desperately needed.

And if the doctor could still hear the heartbroken cries of the man on the other side of the wall, well, then he was definitely indifferent to the man's grievous sobs of obvious shame and remorse over all of the things that the thirteen year old Sam had talked about with the doctor.

"You did really good, Sam… I'm gonna go grab you something to eat from the kitchen, then I want you to get some more rest while I take care of getting your medical records updated."

When the thirteen year old started to object to more rest, the doctor held up his hands to halt him and said "Being unconscious, doesn't count as actual rest, especially considering all the lack of sleep you've been suffering lately."

The child sighed in resignation and nodded as he tried to suppress new tears.

"And if you're worried you won't be able to sleep without nightmares, then I can always give you something that'll help you sleep and keep the nightmares away."

The child took in a refortifying breath then gave a frantic yet appreciative nod, his fragile psyche couldn't take any nightmares right now.

"Okay." Doctor Robert stated, sounding relieved that his patient was trusting him. "I'll go get everything together, you just lay back and take it easy."

After slowly picking his way through a light meal to keep his stomach from rebelling and taking some medicine the doctor gave him, the thirteen year old finally fell into the deep and dreamless sleep that he had been needing for a very long time.

When he woke again, it was dark outside and he could hear whispering coming from the hall. The walls really were paper thin, because he could hear everything they were saying despite how quiet they thought they were being.

He could tell they had argued as both of their voices sounded gravelly, stressed and their words were riddled with underlying double meanings and even a few vague threats here and there.

The doctor was making it clear what he wanted to do to John because of the way the man had been neglecting and abusing both of his sons.. And yes, the doctor made it clear that John was in fact neglecting and abusing his eldest son as well, because all the times he had left Dean to care for Sam, for days and even sometimes WEEKS alone, and sometimes without enough money to last was outright neglect and every time he verbally cut Dean down over how he was caring for Sam when the child only had limited means available, was verbal and emotional abuse…

At first John Winchester had tried to make excuses for his bad parenting, then he had tried to threaten the doctor into compliance and finally when the father saw that Doctor Robert would not back down… The man had broken and had pretty much begged the doctor not to have his sons taken away and swore that he would do anything and everything to prove that he could do a better job at being a father, all he needed was a second chance.

More angry words were exchanged back and forth, but somehow… Doctor Robert had ended up reluctantly agreeing to help all three Winchesters stay together.

Now the men's conversation was turning towards what sorts of medical care to the child in the room on the other side of the wall was going to need now… The doctor talked about how the child was going to have to be on a stringent course of several different medicines to help keep him from contracting any of the Sexually Transmitted Diseases his rapists might have had, which caused the child's breath to hitch because that's something he hadn't thought about… and… Oh, god… What if?...

He didn't realize it but the heart monitor was going berserk and both his father and the doctor came rushing in.

It was his frightened cry of "I could have AIDS?!", that gave away the fact that he had heard the men talking.

"Sam, that's… No one can possibly know that for at least six months." The doctor stated trying to calm the terrified, young teenager down.

It didn't work.

The thirteen year old started shaking violently, fear, anxiety and anger were waging war on his body and he was helpless to stop it.

"Just breathe, Sam.." His father started chanting "Deep breath, deep breath, deep breath. It's gonna be okay. It's gonna be okay.", as Doctor Robert slipped the oxygen mask back over his mouth and nose.

It took about a half hour, but between the doctor his father and a ready supply of oxygen, the child eventually calmed down enough to keep from slipping into another severe panic attack, which was a big relief for both of the men because the doctor couldn't risk giving Sam any more sedatives right then.

After Sam calmed down the men realized their mistake of talking about the kind of care Sam was going to need for a few weeks without involving Sam in their conversation.

There was an embarrassing talk, about two different creams that the thirteen year old was going to have to apply to the insides of his torn rectum, that no one liked having and even worse there was a talk about how he would have to handle bowl movements and how he was going to have to be careful to remember to check both the toilet paper and the inside of the commode for blood for at least two weeks to ensure that the delicate internal stitches haven't ripped. Then there was a talk about all of the medicines he was going to have to take, there was a list longer than his arm for the antibiotics he'd have to take for six weeks, so he'd have a better chance of not contracting any of the Sexually Transmitted Diseases his attackers might have had at the time of the rape, the doctor also wanted him on several other medications to help with sleeping, nightmares as well as the depression he was clearly suffering. Then the doctor berated his father, pointing out that the thirteen year old Sam was not overweight by any stretch of the imagination, but was in fact, suffering from malnutrition and too much strenuous exercise that was taxing his already over stressed heart and causing the 'puffy' look that was actually a tale tell sign that Sam had had a heart condition. The doctor went on to chastise the boy's father for self-diagnosing Sam with bronchitis when the boy was eleven and then giving the child, steroids without consulting a doctor first as those actions could have caused the heart issues that Sam had been suffering from or could have made a pre-existing condition, that a doctor could have caught back then, if John had sought one out, worse...

John Winchester had hung his head, the man was clearly ashamed of how he had been failing his youngest son while having the gall to call the boy 'weak', 'selfish', 'ungrateful' and 'a failure' when it was HIM that was the 'weak', 'selfish', 'ungrateful', 'failure' who hurt and neglected both of his own children out of cowardice…

The only response John could give was a weak "I didn't know the steroids could give him a heart condition…"

The doctor looked at the father sternly "That's because you're not a doctor, John. You need to understand that if either of your sons are hurt or sick then you need to take them to an actual doctor, from now on.. There can't be any room for any more mistakes like this."

"I… I understand." The child's father stated shakily "It's just… Finding a doctor who.."

"Who knows about monsters?" The doctor interrupted. "John... Neither Sam NOR Dean should be going on hunts at their ages… You need to understand that they are BOTH, too young for anything more than a LIGHT focus on some fundamental training on how to handle themselves if a monster were to suddenly show up on your doorstep while you're not there. But nothing more than that… You cannot keep risking their lives by dragging them into the middle of hunts until they're actually old enough to decide whether or not if being a hunter is even what they want to do…. But… I know that it'll be hard to explain to a doctor about why you're hardly ever around or why you move so much… So… IF.. You have no choice but to take the boys to a doctor who knows about hunting, there's always me… And I can get you a list of a few others who have 'private practices' all over the country… I'll have to warn you though… Some of them actually lost their medical licenses for really good reasons… But if you're in a bind and need a doctor who knows the life, then they're good for getting a quick diagnosis and prescriptions, just don't go for anything major or you might find that one of your kids comes out with their belly button sewn to their nose."

The thirteen year old Sam gave a light chuckle at the doctor's remark and the doctor smiled at him in return. "I had a feeling you'd get a kick out of that."

The child had a shy grin on his face as he nodded, it had felt nice to laugh, like it had momentarily made all of his burdens seem lighter somehow.

"Anyway.." The doctor continued "Sam needs to not only be on a strict diet plan that will help him actually pack on a few pounds till he's at a healthy weight, but after he's had plenty of time to heal from the tearing, he will also start having to get the proper exercise he needs to put on some muscle, strengthen his heart as well as his immune system and help him have more energy."

"I have him doing pushups and…" The child's father stated, but the doctor interrupted him.

"You have him working past the point of exhaustion, is what you do… Which is, doing nothing, but making his health worse. Yes… The boy needs exercise. But no more than two hours a day at most and that two hours has to be spread out over a complete twenty-four hour time frame, thirty minutes of jogging an hour after eating breakfast, twenty minutes of weight training with light weights an hour after lunch, twenty minutes of aerobic exercises an hour before bed and as for the rest of the two hours MAXIMUM that he should be exercising in a day, let the boy play some kind of sport, baseball, basketball, something that HE actually likes doing for a change… Because the only way Sam's going to be healthy is if you'd actually let him be just a kid and stop running him, into the ground with such an extreme workout regimen that could cause even some of the toughest of Drill Sergeants to buckle under the pressure and fatigue..."

"I understand now, doc… I won't push Sam into working so hard anymore…"

"Good." The doctor stated sounding happy to have gotten his point across.

"So.." The child's father started, sounding unsure "Uh… How long, before Sam can go home?"

"Well, seeing as the cracked skull could still cause some issues…"

"Just.." The father interrupted and held up his hands, looking overwhelmed "I know I screwed up, I'm never going to forget just how much I screwed up… So… Can you please stop reminding me of just how badly I screwed up with every other sentence and just tell me, when I can take my son home?"

The doctor took a deep breath and looked ready to go on another tirade, but then he saw how crestfallen the child in the bed seemed after hearing just how guilty his father was feeling and apparently it afforded John Winchester a modicum of leniency from the doctor as the doctor replied "You should be able to take him home tomorrow night, so long as you promise to closely monitor him yourself, for any signs that he's having any kind of cognitive issues and you'll also have to get all of his prescriptions filled and promise that YOU will personally administer his medicines because the stuff I'm prescribing him is no joking matter, some of it's the sort of stuff where even the slightest mistake with a dosage could cause serious problems or even death so it is NOT something that Dean can do for you and it is definitely not something that Sam can do on his own… YOU have to be the one giving him the medicine, which means you'll have to be home every night for the next six weeks to make sure that Sam gets the right meds at the right times.."

"Yeah, doc… I promise I'll follow any instructions you give me concerning taking care of Sam's health, to the letter…"

"You'd better." The doctor said sternly as he wrote down a long list of prescriptions for John to fill.

"You weren't kidding about there being a lot.." John's tone was disbelieving.

"Don't worry about price…. Just go to the drug store over on Elm Street and tell them I sent you and said it was okay for you to put it on my tab."

"Thanks, doc…"

"Now, don't go getting all sentimental on me. I still can't stand you… But Sam's a good kid and I just want to see him have the best chance at getting better."

The child's father looked slightly amused by the fact that the doctor couldn't stand him as he gave a shrug then looked at the thirteen year old Sam and said "I'm gonna go ahead and get these to the drug store tonight so the prescriptions can be ready by the time you get to get out of here tomorrow…"

"Kay…" The thirteen year old said with a nod and with that his dad was out the door again.

"Just so you know… You can change your mind anytime you want… If your dad starts acting like a real bastard again, or if you just want to get away from hunting for good, you can always call me and I will help you out, no matter where you wanna stay, even if it's by yourself for a while till you can figure things out.."

"I don't wanna leave Dean.." The child whispered.

"Yeah… I had a feeling you'd say that…. Just… If you ever do change your mind…" The doctor grabbed a piece of paper and hastily wrote something down. "Call me… Okay?"…

"Okay.."

About forty minutes later the child's father was back and he was carrying a big brown paper bag…

The mere sight of the brown paper bag had the child curling into himself because he instantly forgot he was in a (supposedly) safe place where his father (hopefully) wouldn't (couldn't) risk physically hurting him or verbally demeaning him as his mind could only think that there was liquor in that brown paper bag.

His father seemed to understand, because he gave the child a sad smile and whispered… "I figured, you'd need some new pants and stuff since your old ones…" the man let his sentence trail off, well, no one would be wrong in saying that the man lacked tact, when it came to his youngest son.

The boy's father gave a huff of resignation and began pulling an outfit of new clothes from the bag, and from the look of the size of the bag and how full it seemed to be, it was reasonable to assume that there was a whole lot more than just one outfit in that bag.

"Um.." His father shifted from side to side, looking so unsure of everything as he presented the clothes to him "I had a feeling you might wanna go ahead and change right now so you'd have something comfortable to sleep in… So… I'll just leave these here so you can reach them… And… I also got you some soap and toothpaste and stuff… I'll just put the bag over here so you… I'm gonna go wait out in the hall so you can…" The man seemed incapable of finishing a sentence as he placed the paper bag on the table besides the bed Sam was in and darted back out the door.

While his dad had been gone the doctor had told him that he could get out of bed on his own to do small things like go to the restroom, except if he had to go 'number two' because he had to call the doctor for that so the doc could make sure none of his internal stitches ripped, but he could do just about anything else, take a shower, walk around the room, go to the kitchen and raid the fridge, whatever he felt comfortable doing so long as he didn't overdo it and didn't stay out of bed for more than an hour each time and agreed to rest at least an hour between each venture from the bed.

And a shower sounded really good right about now…

He might even spoil himself a little by actually using some hot water.

The child gingerly sat up on the bed and grabbed the paper bag.

Inside were three new outfits of clothes, a new pack of socks, a new pack of underwear, a pair of shoes some hygiene items and… A brown, stuffed dog with some of the saddest hound dog eyes he'd ever seen.

At first the boy thought it was some kind of mistake, that his dad had maybe accidently grabbed someone else's bag… New clothes and hygiene items were one thing… The occasional toy, was rare but had happened at least once or twice… But a stuffed animal?.. It was something so completely out of character for his father to buy, that the boy was genuinely shocked.

Because… It wasn't a mistake…

The child saw that there was a gift tag hanging from one of the stuffed animal's floppy ears and on that gift tag he could see the word "Sam."

His eyes filled up with tears as he buried his face into the fur of the plush animal and he forgot about taking a shower as he cuddled up with the stuffed dog and drifted off to sleep…

And as the scene faded to black, Present day Dean swallowed around the ball of emotions rising in his throat as he reached up with a shaky hand to wipe his eyes and whispered "I can't believe that after everything he did, after all the crap he pulled, our father still thought that trying to buy Sam's forgiveness was going to fix everything… I wish Doc Robert had gone ahead and called Bobby and Pastor Jim anyway, no matter what sorts of promises our father made… Sam… Sammy deserved better than him… He deserved so much better than both of us.."


	9. Chapter 6. Part 4.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ..
> 
> ..
> 
> This is still part of Chapter 6 ..
> 
> Sooo.. The story behind Chapter 6 was it is over 100k words long and I put it all up when writing the original over in FF.net and someone was like "wtf??.. You do know that 100,000 words is NOVEL LENGTH, right?.. You DO realize you gave us a NOVEL LENGTH CHAPTER, right?".. Nope.. I had NOT known that.. And now it's hard to write even just 5 words let alone 5k words because the 100k just poured out on accident.. And someone had to go tell me "how much" that is and then suggested I break the Chapter up because no one would have the patience to read a 100k word Chapter or because some people on Mobile Devices wouldn't be able to read the whole Chapter.. So I took it down and reposted I it section by section and now Chapter 6 is broken up into several Parts instead of being just one part..

..

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The darkness just fades away.

This time Present day Dean is looking at the inside of the cab of his father's truck and he can see Past Sam's reflection in the passenger side window.

The kid is still probably around only thirteen years old and he looks physically and emotionally exhausted and he also looks wary and filled with a deep, dark sadness.

"So, I told Dean…" His father's voice is cut off by the hitch in Sam's breath.

The child starts clutching at the door handle. The truck is still moving when the door flings open.

"What the hell, Sam?!" His father yells as Sam tries to jump from the still moving truck.

His father slams on the brakes and Sam is being pulled back away from the door, but he isn't going without a fight.

"No!" The child shouts as he struggles "He can't know! He can't ever know!"

"Sam!" His father bellows frantically as the child squirms free and his long legs are carrying him out towards a vast expanse of Californian desert… "SAM!"

The child is sobbing frantically as he runs, his body betraying him with every step he takes because all of the pain, it's slowing him down. It's making him tired. So tired. It all hurts so bad.

It feels like the worse sort of betrayal and that hurts too.

Nothing makes sense in his bewildered and terrified mind All he knows is he can't go home. Not if Dean knows.

He won't be able to bear it if his big brother resents him or hates him even more over what's happened.

It doesn't make a lot of sense. He knows it doesn't. There's other reasons Dean can't know. There's other reasons he can't face Dean if Dean knows.

It's best if he just doesn't think.

So he lets go of rationality, of logic and just runs as fast and as far as his traitorous body will take him.

His mind is a complete blank when the ground comes rushing up to meet him.

He lays there frozen. Like a scared rabbit, caught in the jaws of a wolf, the rabbit's trying to pretend it's made of stone so the wolf will just lose interest and let it go. It's best not to struggle. To feign lifelessness. To pretend you're stone.

But stone doesn't have a frantically beating heart. Doesn't breathe, harsh, sobbed out panting breaths of fear, despair, sadness.

Stone doesn't whimper and cringe.

The wolf is telling the rabbit that everything is okay. That Dean thinks the rabbit had really bad appendicitis.

The rabbit can live with that if the wolf can swear that Dean will never know that the rabbit's just a fur pelt now. Everything that was ever inside is gone now. He's hollow, flat… Lifeless. Maybe he is made of stone?... Maybe the rabbit got away and the wolf simply picked up a rock in it's place instead?..

Nothing makes sense.

The world tilts and he feels like maybe the wolf grew wings.

When he's able to really focus again, he realizes he's back in the truck and the wolf has one hand on the wheel, the other arm is wrapped around him, keeping him close. Keeping him from trying to flee again.

The child wants to ask how far he had gotten, how long he had been running. But there's no point. Because apparently he hadn't been able to get far enough, fast enough to evade capture.

There's a sick sense of dread. His father must be so disappointed in him. For so many reasons. But the only thing the child could think of right now was of how disappointed his father must be in him for being so slow.

His father's voice tells him that he's not a disappointment. His father's voice cracks and says he's sorry, that he will spend every day, proving that he can do better. That he can be better. That he can be a better father.

The child doesn't really care if his father gets better or worse or stays the same, all he cares about is keeping his brother from getting hurt by the man, keep his brother from being hurt by him.

He can hear his father crying. He must have said that out loud.

There's a vague memory. The doctor had said there might be side effects, but without the medicine the kid would be miserable from so much pain during the ride home.

His father had said that he didn't want his son to have to be in any more pain from this.

He wishes someone would have actually asked him. He rather be in pain than feel drugged. It's a strangely disorienting feeling. It's a vulnerable feeling.

He really doesn't like it.

He makes a mental note. A promise to himself. He'll take the meds the doc prescribed for him the way he's supposed to, but after that… He's never going to do drugs of any kind ever again.

His head is swimming. He's drowning. No one hears him call for help. He doesn't like this feeling.

He won't willingly let someone do anything to him that might make him feel like this and he damn sure won't ever do something to make himself feel like this.

The child wants to tell his father that there's other things besides pain that can make a person feel miserable.

That pain is really just a confirmation of life.

That this sick, floatie numbness where he feels weak and vulnerable and disoriented is a conformation of things he doesn't want to ever have to deal with…

"Please.." he begs with a sob. He doesn't know how to deal with this. He doesn't want to have to know how to deal with this.

"It's gonna be okay, Sammy." He hears his father's tear filled voice whisper right before the fog consumes him.

He doesn't know how much time has passed, only that the sky outside the cab of the truck has grown darker and that he doesn't feel so hazy anymore.

He wonders where they are.

He shifts and his father tightens the one armed hold on him.

"Wh?.." He asks groggily. He doesn't really remember very much of the drive and what he does remember is vague, like a dream that he's not sure was real. By the way his father is holding him, he figures that it's reasonable to assume that most of what he remembers really did happen… It's humiliating knowing that his dad saw him so out of it like that.

"Hey, kiddo… You waking up?"

"I… Think so…" Well, how else could he answer that question?… He's not feeling very sure about anything right now, least of all that he's really awake and that this is all real and that it all hasn't just been some horrible nightmare with a few sprinklings of halfway decent dreams tossed in to make him believe it's somehow reality.

He feels detached from the whole ordeal and he wants to keep it that way for as long as possible.

But his curiosity gets the better of him.

"Where are we?..." He's feeling more aware now and knows they've had to have been driving for about three hours.

"Bout an hour and a half from home…" His father replies.

Something about that answer feels off. Did they leave California? Why was it taking hours just to drive home?

His furrowed brow must have given away his confusion. "Doctor Robert's "office" is in San Francisco, that's all the way on the other side of the state from where we're staying."

It's not a lot… But the fact that his father had actually had enough patience to answer a question he hadn't even had the chance to ask yet was the little that was going a long way in his father's favor.

"Oh.." He said with a shrug… His father had driven all the way across the state to get him help..

He sat there in the comfortable silence thinking of all the long hours that had gone into each trip he's ever been on. How some of those hours had been thick with anger and tension, how some of those hours had been light with happiness and good memories.

He had spent so many hours on the road. Hours… Hours… HOURS!

A realization struck him blind with anger as it lit up in his mind.

"You lied to me.." he spat out as he pulled away from his father. He had been hurting physically, mentally and emotionally at the time and hadn't exactly been in the right state of mind to catch the lie back then, but he was thinking more clearly now.

"What?..." His father sounded genuinely confused.

"The night.. The night that… That 'It' happened. You yelled at me for calling you while you were in the middle of a hunt. You said you left the hunt because of MY CALL, that the monster you were after got away because of the call I made to you!.."

"Sam… I know I was wrong… I know now that it was an emergency and I'm sorry that I didn't hear you out…"

"I'm not talking about you not hearing me out… I'm talking about the fact that a monster got away and you blamed the call I made when you were already on your way home when I made the call.. That monster got away because something else happened and blaming me for it was more convenient than owning up to however you screwed the hunt up…"

"Sam.." His father growled in warning.

"No.. Don't you… You don't get to deny it… That hunt was two states away… TWO… And you were already back when Dean and I got back to the room that night… It would have taken you hours to get back if you had only left right after the call, unless you had already been on your way when I called. The phone call that I made that night had nothing to do with why you left in the middle of the hunt… Admit it.."

"Sam.." His father's voice was a broken plea this time.

"You not only hit me… But… You hit me with absolutely no justifiable reason… You… I mean… I would've understood if you had at least really thought that I had done something wrong.. But.." The child cried out each word with heartbroken sobs.. "I didn't do anything.." his breath hitched "I didn't do anything to deserve.."

"Sam…" His father's whisper sounded almost fearful "You have to understand I was drunk… I didn't really know what I was…"

"Just… Just stop.." The boy stated with a shake of his head as he pulled himself closer to the passenger side door. The truck slowed down noticeably, his father probably thought he was going to try and jump out again… He actually was a little tempted to do just that, but his rationality was firmly in place and it was telling him that it would be unwise… Earlier when he had been trapped in the hazy fog of strong pain killers he had gotten away with it. He had no delusions that he'd get away with such theatrics now that his mental faculties were mostly back online.

It was a wonder he was getting away with this outburst. With verbally berating his own father… With outright forcing full accountability onto his father's shoulders… And, all of a sudden, he doesn't really care, it's about time his father shouldered some of the blame. His father will probably find some excuse to punish him anyway, so he might as well give the man a reason.

"So… What happened that night?... What made you leave in the middle of a hunt?.."

"Sam…"

"No… I have a RIGHT to know what happened!" The child growled "And more importantly… I have a right to know what made you think that it was okay to blame ME!" his growl turned into a swallowed sob "Why you always think it's okay to blame me.."

"You're right…" His father sounded defeated…

Good. The man needed to learn how it felt. Because it's how he almost always feels and it's time his father knows just a little of that pain as well.

He just 'mmphs' in agreement and raises his eyebrows, silently telling his father with a scathing look that he needs to elaborate. That he's not getting out of this so easily.

He's been getting out of too many things far too easily lately. He needs to know there's going to start being harsh consequences for his wrong choices.

"You're right…" His father states again, it's a little stronger now. "It was a Chupacabre and it was me and one other hunter against it… No matter what we did, the bastard wouldn't die. And worse than that. I made the mistake of cutting off one of the damn thing's hands."

"Oh, dad…" His voice is a shocked and angry groan of frustration.

"A man died because of me… A little girl lost her dad because of me… A good woman lost her husband because I didn't… Because…"

"Because you went in without having done the proper research first!" The thirteen year old snapped "And now another hunter's out taking on a hunt that you couldn't finish without the proper backup because you wouldn't listen to me!... People won't die because of me… They'll die because of your ignorance!"

"You better watch your tone, Sam…"

"Or what?!" He's getting a bit hysterical now… He knows his mind is being devoured by lunacy, but he's so tired of fighting the pull of this righteous insanity. "You gonna beat me?! Call me worthless and useless some more?!.. Send me away?! WHAT?!... What are you gonna do?!"

The truck has come to a stop now, his father reaches across the seat a grabs the front of his shirt. He flinches violently and shrinks into himself. Fear eating away at his anger. A voice in his head is chanting "Bad idea. Bad idea… Such a bad idea… Oh god, he's gonna kill me…"

He's pulled across he seat. His body is too weak to really do more than put up a sadly feeble struggle that will do nothing to save him.

He doesn't realize how badly he's trembling until strong arms wrap around him and help him keep from flying apart like an exploding toaster. His dad asks when he's ever seen a toaster explode, he whispers "Don't ask.. One time when Dean was about ten he wanted to see what would happen if he put the toaster inside the microwave.. It wasn't pretty."

His dad laughs and hugs him tighter. He feels a little bad now for yelling at him. He wants to take back the mean things he said.

His dad says not to worry about it. That he deserved to hear that and more, That nothing anyone could say or do would be enough to punish him for what he's done. For how he's failed as a father.

He tells his father he hasn't failed, that there's still a chance…

His dad breathes a sigh of relief.

That makes the child feel a little bit better. He hopes his dad knows he loves him. That he wants to be able to trust him again.

His dad gives him one more comforting squeeze before turning back to the wheel and starts them back on their journey home.

The thirteen year old spends the rest of the ride hoping that maybe… Just maybe… Things really will get better.

~0~

He and his dad are both exhausted, mentally, physically and emotionally, when they finally reach their destination. But there's a certain kind of peace between them now. An unspoken understanding of sorts.

The child knows that he no longer has to be afraid of his father… And from now on he's going to call his father out on every choice on every order, because it could mean the difference between life and death.

He knows that his father knows that his youngest son is no longer afraid of holding him accountable for everything he will ever say or do from here on out. He knows that his father knows, that, that means that a lot of heated arguments will be in their futures. But there's a certain kind of peace in knowing he'll be heard…. That his father will make a strong argument just to establish dominance, but now it's never going to be anything more than reasserting that he's the authority of their household. There's not going to be anymore hitting or hurtful words like before. He can feel safe in making sure his concerns will be heard by his father.

He doesn't have to be afraid anymore. The monster that was hiding beneath his dad's skin is gone now and he hopes it won't ever come back.

His dad cooks supper for them for the first time in a long time and the three of them eat at the table like a regular family. His big brother wants to see if he has a cool scar on his stomach now. His dad says the doctor didn't actually have to remove his appendix, that he just has to take a few different antibiotics for a while and get plenty of rest and he'll be good as new.

His big brother whispered to him that he got gypped cause girls dig scars, but that's cool "Means more girls for me."

He rolls playfully jabs his elbow into his big brother's ribs and rolls his eyes, their dad tells him he can't be rough housing. His big brother sticks his tongue out at him…

And he thinks… That here in this moment his family loves him and that makes life worth trying to live…

He no longer wants to die.

His dad makes sure he gets all the meds he's supposed to have then his dad makes him a comfortable place to rest on the living room sofa because his ribs are still tender… There's no mocking him for needing to sleep in a reclined position, this time around, his dad wants him to be able to be comfortable.

It's not a lot, but it goes a long way. His dad is earning back his trust, little by little. He's earning his forgiveness, little by little.

And over the next week life stays as good as it could ever be for him. His dad takes care of him. His big brother spends time with him. He even gets to go ahead and go back to school so long as he doesn't have to participate in P.E. which won't be a problem because school will be out for summer in exactly two weeks' time and end of school assemblies and plays will be taking over the gym and the field around the track, so there's not going to be any P.E. for the rest of the year.

But things start to go downhill one day when his big brother's teaching him how to play Texas Hold'em.

He's sitting there, trying to figure out if he should raise or call. They're only betting cookies, so it shouldn't matter either way. But he wants to win at least one hand to show that he's getting the hang of it.

He looks up and sees his big brother staring at him with an expression of hurt and anger.

"What?" He honestly doesn't know what he's done to put that look on Dean's face.

His big brother tilted his head and huffed "I just realized what today is, is all…"

"And?…"

"You must have been pretty mad at me to get rid of your bracelet, huh?"

"Uh… I have no idea what you're talking about…"

"Your bracelet, Sam… The one I gave you for your birthday last year…"

A pang of fear stopped his heart for a fraction of a second, then he remembered that his big brother doen't know why his bracelet is gone. "I didn't get rid of it, Dean."

"Uh huh… Yeah, right." His big brother stated with bitter sarcasm "You got mad at me for not remembering your birthday and threw it away, didn't you?"

"No… I'd never do something like that…"

"Whatever, Sam… Glad to know it was worth so much to you…" His brother tossed his cards onto the couch and started to storm off.

"I lost it… Okay?" The younger boy cried out with a hasty plea… "The night I got sick, dad had to carry me out to the truck and .. It must have fallen off my wrist." He lied "I would never have thrown it away." That part, was the honest to goodness truth. He wouldn't have ever done something like that, no matter how mad he was.

His brother didn't look like he believed him… Is this what they'd come to?.. His brother didn't believe him…. Didn't believe in him.

His world came crashing back down around his ears again.

"If I had thrown it away, then why would I still have this one?" He asked as he held up his other wrist that was still adorned with the first bracelet his big brother had ever given him. He's so glad the bad men hadn't taken this one too. Losing them both would have broken him beyond repair.

His big brother deflated, the anger was gone as quickly as it had arrived and now it was obvious that the older boy felt bad. Which made the younger boy feel horrible because he had caused that.

"Sorry, Sammy." His big brother whispered as he sat back down on the far end of the couch by Sam's feet.

"Me too." The younger brother replied as tears formed in his eyes "I swear, I didn't mean to lose it."

The major crisis that could have come from this had been successfully adverted. But the next few crisis wouldn't be avoided so easily.

His dad started having to be out of the cabin more and more again… This time the man was actually trying to bring in some honest money by fixing up people's cars and trucks around the town they lived in.

And it had been good money too, seeing as how they were in the middle of the desert and the nearest mechanic was sixty miles away.

But his dad having to be gone more again, meant Dean having to be responsible for more again.

At first. It had been okay. His big brother had taken it all in stride. But then those old resentments started to creep back in when all the seventeen year old wanted was to go to his Junior Prom two days before school ended and the answer had been a firm and nonnegotiable "No."…

Then, came a phone call for help that his father couldn't turn away.

An hour after the phone call he was looking at a cheap plastic, weekly medicine dispenser his father had picked up at the gas station and his father was telling him he'd be fine so long as he took each evening's worth of meds on the right evenings and no more than that.

And… Wasn't that just super awesome parenting?... His father wasn't just breaking a promise he made to another grown up, he was also giving a thirteen year old child who was known to have suicidal thoughts access to a week's worth of dangerously potent, MIXED, medicines all at once and hoping the divider would keep the kid from popping more than one day's worth of pills at a time.

It was just sad how clueless his father could be sometimes.

The seventeen year old Dean wasn't very happy with this turn of events either, if the way he slammed their bedroom door after their dad left that night was anything to go by.

The next day he could occasionally hear his brother grumble that he could be out. He could be at Prom. He could be making out in the back seat of the Impala with 'What's Her Face'.. But… No.. He was stuck at home, babysitting his helpless kid brother.

And the night closed with a bitter tension thickening the air.

It was making the thirteen year old start wondering why he was even still trying… But he did his duty. He took the right meds the way he was supposed to. And then he laid on the couch silently crying himself to sleep.

When he woke up he trudged to the bathroom and started seriously thinking about taking up his self-chosen instrument of punishment once more… He was the reason his big brother lost out on the opportunity to experience an important rite of passage.

But the thought of cutting has lost it's appeal. All he can think when he looks at the edge of the blade is that he wants to cut.. Bad things.. He wants to punish bad things… And when he looks in the mirror, he no longer sees a bad thing. Because he's not the one who told his big brother 'No.' about the Prom, he's not the one who dumped his kid off on Dean while he went traipsing around the country side, chasing after things from nightmares.

Blades are for cutting bad things… And he doesn't think he's bad. Not anymore.

So, he puts the blade away and showers and gets dressed for school.

His new school isn't so bad, he's actually managed to make a couple of friends he knows he's never gonna see again once he leaves this place. It's like a game… See who gets attached first. Him or them. It's always him. He's just too desperate for human connections that don't hurt.

He spends two hours after school at the town library because his brother is late picking him up and he is not going to even attempt walking over sixty miles to get to the tiny little town next door where 'home' is.

His brother seems agitated when he gets there and he wants to say "Don't look at me… I'm not the one who pissed in your Wheaties, dude…", but he keeps quiet. If his brother is going to be mad, then there's not a lot that can make him change his mind.

Dean is too much like their dad when it comes to anger and Sam knows he hasn't really got anything that will diffuse the situation. His big brother is not in the right mind set for hearing him out, even if he did.

His big brother says he wants to meet some of his friends at the park before they head back to the cabin and the thirteen year old knows it's his obligation to 'be cool' this is a big deal…. A total privilege. Hanging out with older kids. Cool kids, like Dean.

Except they're not cool kids, like Dean.

Turns out being seventeen doesn't automatically make a person awesome.

The boys Dean wants to hang out with, smoke… And it's not cigarettes they're smoking. He can't believe his big brother wants to hang out with these low lives.

But he's not going to say a word to their father because if their father found out either of them had been around dugs of any kind that weren't prescribed to them by a doctor, it'd probably start raining fire and brimstone, and that would be the pleasant part of their dad finding out.

His brother is seventeen after all… What harm could a little teenage rebellion do?

One of the guys offers him a 'hit' he says no… he doesn't want any 'hits' of any kind, 'thank you very much' (loser)…

The guy calls him a pussy… Which is just so vulgar and.. Gross.

He moves to take a few steps away, hoping the group of older kids will ignore him.

The guy who called him a pussy body checks him and he clenches his fists and growls at the guy to back the hell off.

His brother pulls the douchebag.. (See, vulgar, yet accurate, insult… ASSHOLE!) away from him and shoves him towards the other boys.. But it's with a laugh and some jokes about how "Little Samantha" just doesn't know how to cut lose and that he's hoping his sister will grow out of this 'bitchy' phase.

Really?... Oh, hell, no.

The thirteen year old storms off and climbs back into the Impala. He's not getting back out of the car until it's parked outside the cabin they're currently living in and his brother will be lucky if he ever speaks to him ever again.

And to think he had thought those little punks were so beneath his brother! Turns out his brother might actually be beneath them…

He knows his wounded pride and his hurt feelings are darkening his thoughts, but that had been humiliating and he is pissed off about it.

Present day Dean doesn't even remember any of this. He guesses he must have been too high to care but he's not high right now, and he cares so much that it's killing him to know that he was such an evil little shithead back then.

God, how had his brother been able to stand being around him back then after all the crap he had pulled? He wishes now that he had never touched Marijuana or booze, because apparently his dad wasn't the only Winchester that became a monster once he was under the influence.

When his big brother got back in the car, the thirteen year old wanted to gag, the 'distinctive' scent of 'pot' was sickeningly cloying and he did not want to have to be cooped up in a car for over an hour drive with that stench, even with the windows rolled down.

He let out a groan that voiced his annoyance as he cranked his window all the way down. He might not like it, but it was better than walking.

Once they were almost out of town his brother lulled his head in the direction of his brother and said "Man, you totally just embarrassed me in front of my friends."

"I embarrassed, you?" He asked indignantly "One of your 'friends' called me a freaking 'pussy' and then you turn right around and make it worse by calling me 'Samantha' and your SISTER… Sister?.. And I'm the one who embarrassed, you?.. Really, Dean?"

"They're not gonna hang out with me again if I can't start finding someplace to leave you. They don't want a rat around."

"A rat?" The younger boy asked with an angry scoff.

"Yeah, someone who might tattle on them.."

"I know what you meant Dean.. And you don't gotta worry cause I won't say crap."

"Oh, I know you won't, cause you were there too and little, Mister Goody Two-Shoes can't have anyone thinking he's anything other than flawless."

His brother wasn't just high, he was drunk as well. Just great.

"Dean, maybe we should go back to that diner so you can get some coffee or something."

"Maybe we should go to that diner so you can get some coffee." His big brother meeped out mockingly. "You're such a drag, Sam, no one's ever gonna think you're cool if you don't stop being such a dork."

"I'd rather be a dork for the rest of my life than some loser that smokes that crap."

"Well, don't worry, you won't ever have to be around that crap ever again, cause I found out that Bartsow has a Plucky's, I'll just start dropping you off there and doubling back to Yermo to hang out with the guys."

"No." The thirteen year old growled. "You are not leaving me at another Plucky's ever again."

"The hell I'm not… You think I wanna be stuck with you instead of getting to hang out with my friends?"

"You could always just leave me at the cabin."

"Yeah, when Hell freezes over. If someone ever started asking questions about why you're always home alone, dad would have my hide."

"He'd also have your hide if he ever found out you smoked pot and drove while you were both high and drunk." The thirteen year old stated smugly.

"You won't tell."

"I'd rather get in trouble for being at a place where people were smoking pot than have you ditch me at another crappy kiddie restaurant just so you can go hang out with those loser potheads."

"You just love to screw up everything, don't you?" His big brother growled angrily.

"You're the one who's screwing everything up by getting high and drunk with people you have no business being around."

The brothers didn't talk for the rest of the ride home. And the few words they said once they were back at the cabin were spoken with anger or disappointment.

The next day went by in a blur, and when they got home from school his big brother was still royally pissed at him. Somewhere, deep down he knew his big brother was going to deal out retribution of some kind. He just didn't know how his brother was going to make him suffer.

He was achy and tired and he really had to take a dump but he was terrified of how much it was going to hurt. Of how it might cause him to start bleeding again. He remembered that Doc Robert had suggested he soak in a tub full of hot water to help his muscles relax so he could have an easier time with passing a bowl movement and right now, soaking in a tub full of warm water seemed like it would be an awesome idea.

His brother said he was heading out to Yermon to go hang out with his 'friends' so the child knew he had at least two hours of time to himself.

He filled the tub with steaming hot water then stripped down and eased himself in, hissing as his body got used to the slightly burning temperature of the water.

It felt nice. Just being able to soak out the aches in his muscles and still sore rib cage.

He dozed lightly, letting the water lull him into a soothing state of relaxation, he knew he'd have to get out soon and try using the toilet, but just thinking about it made him tense up. So, he stalled. It would be wrong to use a tub full of water and not at least use it to bathe.

He tried scrubbing the 'dirty' feeling from his skin and was unsuccessful, the water was starting to get cold, he might as well go ahead and wash his hair.

Massaging the shampoo into his scalp started helping him to relax again. Maybe, MAYBE, he'd be able to actually be able to use the toilet after all.

He was almost completely relaxed. His muscles were practically Jello by the time he was done getting his hair lathered up. He laid back into the water to rinse his hair and tried to keep a hold of that relaxing sensation that was thrumming through him, putting him at ease.

But then as he ran his hands through his hair, he felt gobs of hair, clinging to them.

Confused, he brought his hands around in front of him. They were covered in hair.

Frightened, he scrambled out of the tub to see that the water was full of hair… His hair.

His hair was falling out!

Sobbing he tried toweling what was left dry only to watch it fall out as well. The bathroom was a mess. Hair… His hair was everywhere except on his head where it belonged.

Oh, god… What if?...

A sob escaped him… What if he was sick?… What if the bad men had made him sick after all?

With shaky hands he dialed his father's cell phone number and when his father answered with a somber "Yeah?", all he could do was wail "Dadddy, I'm dying… I'm dying."

The line went dead. He hoped his father wasn't going to just leave him to die.

How long would it take for AIDS to kill him?

He was still trembling as he pulled on some lose sweats and a baggy t-shirt. He'd never feel warm again. He'd never feel safe again. He was dying. The bad men had killed him. And Dean was going to end up finding out what had happened… There was no way to keep it a secret now. How else would he have gotten AIDS?

The world was shrouded in a panic induced fog.

Why him?

He had been taking the medicine the way he was supposed to.

Everything was supposed to be okay.

But now nothing would be okay, ever again.

He was dying. The bad men had killed him.

His father must have flown. Or he might have been out of it longer than he realized.

His father was gathering him into his arms and the child started wailing what had happened, how all of his hair had suddenly fallen out and how it surely meant he had AIDS, how it surely meant he was dying.

He was bawling incoherently when he heard a familiar rumble coming from outside. His big brother was back too.

He tried to compose himself. Maybe they could tell another lie.. There had to be a lie that would keep Dean from knowing.

His father hugged him tighter then released him and met Dean at the door.

Dean could see him over their father's shoulder and he shrank into himself, he couldn't bear it if his big brother would look at him differently now.

Everything was muted. He heard occasional snippets of an argument.

Why were they arguing?

He was dying and his family had nothing better to do with his last few moments in the world than fight?

He heard words like "Practical joke" and "Nair" and "It was supposed to be funny."..

Except it wasn't. It so was not funny by any stretch of his imagination.

But, he understood now. This had been the retribution his big brother had chosen to rain down on him. This was his brother's way of getting even with him for messing up his childhood and he could deal with that.

It was actually a relief to know he wasn't sick, that he didn't have AIDS, that he wasn't dying.

But his father was FURIOUS…

He ordered the seventeen year old to go do a hundred laps around the empty lot that was out behind the cabin and the seventeen year old shot a glare at the thirteen year old, that promised more suffering the second their father wasn't looking.

The younger boy couldn't stand it. His brother was mad at him! And he hadn't done anything wrong this time!

He chased his big brother outside. "I'll run them with you.", he blurted out. He was the reason his big brother was in trouble, so he'd run the laps with him. Maybe then, his big brother would see that they're on the same side here..

"Just stay the hell away from me, Sam!" His big brother roared "I'm so sick of you ruining my life!"

The thirteen year old felt his heart stutter brokenly in his chest as his brother took off at a running pace that he would never be able catch up with. Tears formed in his eyes as he trudged back into the cabin.

When his father looked up at him, he broke down sobbing, wailing that he'd ruined Dean's life.

He looked at his father and screamed "He thinks I ruined his life. He thinks that I ruined his life because that's what YOU made him think! My brother HATES me because of you!"

"Sam…"

"FIX IT!" The thirteen year old bellowed "FIX IT NOW!"

His father looked like someone had just slapped him. He shot up out of his chair and the thirteen year old only continued to glare at him with venomous daggers of hate. The child wasn't going to flinch back, he was too pissed to be afraid of anything besides the possibility of losing Dean.

His father brushed past him and headed outside.

The boy heard his father call Dean's name. A few minutes later, there was more yelling. But now his father was yelling "What if that 'crap' had gotten in 'your brother's eyes, Dean? What if it'd caused him to go blind?! He could have lost his sight because of the stunt you pulled."

He could hear how guilty his big brother had sounded when he replied that he hadn't been thinking.

His father was a bit quieter now, but the child could still hear him say "You broke Sam's heart by saying what you said to him… Is that what you want, Dean, to hurt your brother?"

He heard his brother huff out "No, Sir."

His father replied "Sam's the only reason why you're not gonna have to do those hundred laps. Because he doesn't want you to be hurt, either… Do you understand what I'm saying, Dean?"

"Yes, Sir… I'm sorry, I didn't mean to hurt him…"

"You shouldn't be telling me that… It's him you need to apologize to…" He heard his father sigh "He loves you, Dean. You have to love him too…"

"Yes, Sir."…

The thirteen year old choked back a sob, his father had just ordered his big brother to love him… That was wrong… It was so wrong. He didn't want his brother to feel obligated to love him. He didn't want his brother burdened by emotions he didn't really feel.

A few moments later, his big brother was hugging him and telling him how sorry he was.

Like daddy's good little soldier. Always following orders.

There was no comfort in his big brother's embrace. Because he knew that Dean didn't mean it.

Present day Dean broke down bawling… There was a lot of that conversation that the thirteen year old Sam hadn't heard.

Like their father saying "Somewhere deep down, you have to love him too… Don't you love your brother, even just a little, Dean?"

"Yes, Sir.. With all my heart."

Present day Dean got it now… Years ago when the spirit of Doctor Sanford Ellicott got to Sam… The things that Sam had said back then were finally making actual sense.

Sam had been angry because he thought the only reasons his big brother loved him was because of 'duty', 'obligation' and "Daddy's orders", but Sam had managed to fight to keep from pouring all of it out, because he really hadn't wanted to hurt his big brother.

Present day Dean was pretty sure he couldn't feel any worse than he was feeling right now.

All the times he had jumped to conclusions and wrongly judged Sam, because he thought he had known everything about his kid brother. Turns out. He really hadn't known anything about Sam.

He heard his brother's voice echoing from years back… Growling at him… "You don't know anything about me… And you never will.."

And now he understands what Sam had meant back then, too.


	10. Chapter 6. Part 5.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ..
> 
> ..
> 
> Yep.. Still part of Chapter 6..

..

..

Present day Dean watched through several fades of gray, taking him on a journey through the next few days of the thirteen year old Sam's memories. He watched as his past self, forged a seemingly stronger bond with the young Sam, but he knew now that appearances could be deceiving, because he could hear Past Sam's thoughts. He knew now that back then, the still very young, and still very emotionally hurt and traumatized, Sam hadn't fully believed that his big brother's love came from anything more than duty and obligation. But… There was still a hope. A bright burning ember in the young Sam's soul, close to his heart. A hope that did believe. That did believe fully in his big brother's love for him. It was just something that an emotionally distraught and physically, mentally and spiritually hurt and exhausted CHILD who was blanketed by an achingly dark despair couldn't exactly knowingly access. But it had been there, and it had empowered the young boy. It had helped to keep the child going. It had given the thirteen year old Sam a reason to live.

He journeyed through the darkness several times and each time the gentle and comforting 'whurring' sound had been present, sometimes softer, sometimes louder, sometimes, so faint he could barely hear it. But no matter how faint it was, the pull it had on him, never diminished. He was desperate to know what that sound was. Desperate to know how it was able to comfort him so much no matter what sorts of heartbreaking things he had seen.

And there had been several heart breaking things.

He had watched as the young Sam had gone toe to toe, and chest to chest with their father in argument after argument and he had watched as some of those arguments looked frighteningly close to coming to blows. But John Winchester had so far stuck to his words as around two years and several explosive arguments later, he hadn't laid a hand on Sam again… Yet… But that hadn't meant that the boy had come out unscathed. Emotions could be bruised just as easily as flesh. And their father might not have hit Sam again, but he had said some pretty cruel and nasty things to Sam throughout that three years. Some of it had come out in the heat of an argument, other times it had come because the man had, had the nerve to take up getting drunk again.

He had listened as his Past self, had fallen for lie after lie. One lie being that some of the medications that the thirteen year old Sam had had to take had had side effects and some of those side effects had been the new development of Sam's sudden 'irrational' fear of clowns. His Past self, had just bought it, hook, line and sinker, he hadn't even thought to question it. And suddenly the knowledge of Sam's fear of clowns had become so ingrained that he actually could no longer remember a time when Sam hadn't been afraid of clowns. And he could remember how another lie had been his dad saying that he had a 'hunt' back down in Florida, but the man had left his two sons in California over the duration, for some odd reason and it had annoyed the then seventeen year old Dean, but he hadn't questioned it.

And now he knew the truth about that sudden 'hunt' his father had gone on about four weeks weeks after the then thirteen year old Sam's attack of appendicitis. From Sam's memories he could see that upon their father's return, John Winchester had taken the young Sam out for a 'supply run' ("The boy needs to start learning how to shop for the basics on his own." Their father had stated) and while they were out, their father had put the young Sam's fears about at least some things to rest. He had gone to the prison where the two evil bastards were detained and had found out that both men had gone into the system, free of any STD's which meant that the young Sam could breathe a bit easier, knowing that he hadn't contracted a horrible, possibly, terminal disease. Their father had also made sure that certain evidence pointing towards one Sam Winchester being the monsters' only surviving victim, that law enforcement officials were seeking, had disappeared. It hadn't been needed anyway, the men who had hurt the thirteen year old Sam had basically been thrown UNDER the jail just from the murder charges, that they had both ended up confessing too, alone.. Neither man had any chance of an acquittal because they had both confessed the most heinous of their crimes… And because they were monsters who had raped and murdered over twenty very young CHILDREN they were not going to fare well in prison.

Present day Dean had watched through some proud, and rather spookily, revealing moments as well.

He had watched as his father had allowed Sam to join a soccer team for a few months in the fall of Ninety-Six, he had seen his father's disappointment as the thirteen year old Sam had chosen to actually go to soccer practice and soccer games, rather than archery practice or anything else, hunting oriented, and he had also seen his father's apparent pride when Sam had shown he was a natural when it came to training with a knife. A blade. The boy's personally chosen method of dispatching 'bad things'. Which was just a bit distressing when Present day Dean thought about just how much meaning blades had for Sam and how and why they had come to mean so much to his kid brother.

He had watched as the still young Sam had stuck to the diet and exercise plan that Doctor Robert had given him and started actually slimming down and gaining strong, lean muscles that would end up being the basis of the power house body that the grown up Sam would eventually obtain.

There had also been a few moments that had almost broken his heart. He had watched as young Sam had beaten up a bully named Dirk McGregor and dubbed the boy "Dirk the Jerk' and knew the heartbreak his brother would suffer when he realized that the words he had said out of anger and hurt feelings, had helped drive another troubled youth to suicide. And of course, he witnessed how a Kitsune' named Amy really had saved a young Sam's life and he felt a twinge of guilt at having been so hasty in his action against her, when in reality she had committed a crime that almost any human in her shoes would have gladly committed if it meant saving their child. What had given him the right to be her Judge, Jury and Executioner? Had he not also proven that he was capable of murdering a human, especially if murdering a human somehow saved Sam or helped to keep him safe?

He had once said that it scared him, knowing what sorts of lengths he would go to, to save or protect his family and at the time it had been terrifying to know what sorts of atrocities he could be capable of if the right buttons were pushed… But now, if he really thought about it, that kind of thinking wasn't so frightening anymore. He had reached a point where he could ice someone, almost anyone, monster or human, foe or friend, even Cass or Benny, maybe even Bobby if he wasn't already dead, without a second thought if it meant saving or protecting Sam… How did that make him any different from Amy, who had just been trying to save the life of her very young son?... From over half of the 'things' or people he had killed who might have just been trying to save or protect their family, their home or themselves from the humans who had been encroaching on, or outright taking over, their territory or actively hunting their kin?...

Really, what business did he have being an executioner of 'things' that had only committed the same sorts of sins that he would also commit, that he had also committed?

And he had been filled with sorrow once he had found out just how devastated the still young Sam had been when he learned his big brother had dropped out of school when Sam had still been just thirteen as it hadn't reached the boy's fourteenth birthday yet… The thirteen year old had been crushed under the weight of the knowledge that his big brother no longer had ambitions of his own, and now only had the ambitions their father had forced onto his big brother. He had sworn to himself that he would NOT fall prey to his father's whims like his big brother had, he would be more than just his father's 'good little soldier'. He would get his big brother free from hunting.

~0~

There had also been so many times that Present day Dean had felt so helpless as he had watched, from just out of arms' reach knowing that he couldn't do anything to help, as he witnessed the still young Sam suffering from one gut wrenchingly terrifying nightmare after another but none of that had compared to all the times he heard his father telling the child that it was time he 'got over it', 'got past it', like what had happened to Sam had been something that could 'just be gotten over or gotten past'… There was no 'getting over or past', something like that! Hearing those words had been worse than a slap to the face for a still young Sam. It had made him feel like he was weak, like he was a failure. It had been devastating for the already, emotionally fragile child.

And what had been the worst, was when it had become apparent by the time that Sam had reached fourteen, that the boy was indeed, NOT going to 'just' "get over it" or "get past it", their father had saw fit to commit the worst sort of violation, against his own son… No, the man hadn't hit the boy.

He had taken the fourteen year old Sam to a powerful psychic named Fred Jones and had the man erase the trauma from Sam's memory, making it like it had never happened and replacing the child's memories from around that time, altering them, tampering with the young boy's mind, making the child remember everything BUT the trauma and everything else had become simply memories of really having been sick with appendicitis, and the Nair incident, had simply been just a practical joke gone horribly wrong when a thirteen year old Sam had thought that the side effects of his medications had given him Cancer, making the child feel foolish for his overreaction. Everything else though, that had stayed the same, Sam could still remember how he had come to feel like his big brother only loved him out of the duty and obligation of having to follow 'daddy's orders' "like a good little soldier" and also, Sam's innate and unrelenting fear of clowns. No matter what Fred Jones had tried, he had not been able to dig that out of the young Sam's mind, for it had been buried too deeply. Way down in the child's subconscious, telling him, that clowns were bad, that they were evil and they would hurt him… In fact the action of removing the memories of the events surrounding the rape had served to actually make the child's fear of clowns even WORSE than it had already been. So, the child's father had accepted defeat in that area and Sam's fear of clowns had simply become something that John Winchester had learned to take in stride.

And there was something else that removing Sam's memories of the rape and tampering with his memories surrounding the events of the rape had done to Sam…

It had flushed every ounce of trust, faith and respect that the boy had gained in and for his father, right down the toilet, because Sam had been a smart kid and while he might not know that there was something he had been FORCED, against his will, to forget, he could sense, that something, had been done to him, that there were things being kept from him that he had a right to know about. That there were lies being told right to his face by his father. He could feel it in his bones, in his soul, that his father could NOT be trusted…

Seeing these things had waylaid Present day Dean like a punch from a world class, heavyweight boxer.

His dad… THEIR father… Had willingly and knowing allowed and encouraged, someone, to tamper with Sam's mind… With Sam's FREE WILL. All because it had been easier for the man to make his child forget the rape rather than having to learn how to actually HELP his child deal with the heavily burdening aftermath of such a horrible and life changing ordeal. And of course, it had been rather convenient for the man that Sam's memory of it somehow being his fault that a hunter had died because of him, due to an irresponsible phone call had remained but the memory of the undeserved, unjust, ABUSIVE slap to his face had been removed.

So, Sam had grown to around fifteen years of age, sometimes knowing, by the feeling in the pit of his stomach that his father was keeping something from him, and there had been times when the angst filled, stubborn and hardheaded teenage boy had been suspicious that his big brother knew what it was. It had led to the boy sometimes lashing out by questioning and sometimes even outright defying EVERYTHING, because he hadn't TRUSTED, ANYTHING or ANYONE and by becoming increasingly argumentative. And sometimes… Sometimes the boy had argued, simply because something in the pit of him had told him, that if he didn't make a good argument, that if he couldn't make his points, his FEARS, known and HEARD, then, it could cost his family, or even someone else, their lives. Because something, deep within him had told him, that, he couldn't always trust his father to do a 'job' right.

~0~

Once again, he was standing in a pitch black void, straining to hear the comforting sound that had again grown as faint as a whisper.

When the darkness faded he could recognize the outside of Bobby's salvage yard and wondered when he was, if he was seeing things from his Past self's point of view, or Sam's.

He knew that whoever's perspective he was viewing things from, was angry. He could feel their seething anger, boiling deep within them.

He saw his father storming over to him, looking like a pissed off bull, about to charge.

Oh… So, he must be seeing things from Sam's point of view. He had been the only one who could make their father look so angry.

The man did charge. He grabbed Past Sam up by the front of his shirt and growled in his face with breath that carried the foul stench of whisky. "You disrespectful little bastard! How dare you defy me like that in front of others?!"

"I was only doing what I knew was right!…"

"You went against my orders! In front of everyone!"

"Because your 'orders' were wrong…" Past Sam's growl was cut off by a vicious slap to the face.

"What the hell?" Bobby Singer's voice roared as he pulled John off of Sam.

Everything became a chaotic blur of panic as the young Sam witnessed Bobby chasing John all the way to John's truck with a shotgun that had seemingly manifested from out of thin air.

The boy had stood frozen with fear and confusion as his father ordered him to get in the truck and Bobby had told him that he didn't have to… That he didn't have to go.

"But Dean…" The boy had choked out then he looked at Bobby with tears shining in his eyes "Please don't tell Dean?" the plea had made him sound so helpless and vulnerable, but it had been the only other thing that the boy seemed to be able to think, to say and Bobby had nodded, then hung his head in understanding as he watched Sam climbing into the passenger side seat of the truck, like he had known that there would be nothing he could do unless he got to both boys together.

"Sam… You and Dean are welcome here anytime." Bobby had said in a pained tone that spoke volumes because it was clear he had known what he was losing and how he might be possibly losing it (them) for good "But… You John…" Bobby's voice had become a menacing growl "You better never come back unless you want your ass filled with buckshot.."

The only answer Bobby had gotten was John Winchester's truck peeling out of his driveway.

Present day Dean didn't know what had caused his father to get angry enough to hit Sam AGAIN, and he found… That it didn't matter. That it really didn't matter to him if Sam had called their father every name under the sun and had actually taken a swing at the man, because after all the things he had witnessed John Winchester would have deserved it. He no longer cared what John's side of the story might have been, because now he knew, down deep in his core that if Sam had felt so strongly about something that he had defied their father IN FRONT OF OTHERS, then it was something that Sam had known he was right about and he didn't need to see what had happened to know that simple fact… Sam had known he was right, had done what he had felt was right… And it wasn't hard to guess that, that was what had set John Winchester off, as if he had somehow, had, had the right to treat his child any way he had wanted to, especially if that child had just proven him wrong and humiliated him in front of others…. It made Present day Dean sick to his stomach knowing that, that monster, had been someone he had idolized, whose orders he had followed blindly, whose affection and approval he had yearned for more than almost anyone else's.

He remembered when this had to have been now… He had been twenty when he had been sent to work with Pastor Jim out in Montana and a Sam, who had just turned sixteen, had stayed behind with their father to work with their father, Caleb, Mac, Joshua and Bobby on his first ever real hunt where he got to take point (except it wouldn't have been really taking point if John Winchester had still been trying to give him orders, but that was another story), and how after that hunt his father had said that he had, had a 'falling out' with Bobby, that Bobby had chased him away with a shotgun and how he was no longer welcome on Bobby's property… Of course his father had apparently left out the 'WHY' he had, had a 'falling out' with Bobby and the just barely, sixteen year old Sam had stayed quiet about whatever had happened. Of course the boy had stayed quiet. He had been terrified of his father and had been terrified of ruining his big brother's hero just like he had been when the first slap had happened, but Sam conveniently hadn't been able to remember that.

He had watched how after they had peeled out onto the highway, his father had laid the blame for everything that had just happened at Bobby's directly onto Sam's shoulders… Telling Sam that it was his fault that a friendship of over fifteen years had just been ruined in the blink of an eye. Then his father had started in on how his insubordination and ignorance was going to be 'the reason Dean died', that HE was going to be 'the reason Dean died', that his failure to follow orders could end up getting innocent people and good hunters alike, killed, that his 'irresponsibility' had already been the reason for the death of one man… His father had told the sixteen year old Sam that he was 'useless' and 'weak' and 'worthless'... And the sixteen year old Sam had taken every single word to heart, because the boy still hadn't been able to feel his own self-worth back then. Because that ability had continually been ripped away from him… Like he hadn't been allowed to see, to recognize, to feel, his own self-worth..

How the trauma of his father hitting him like THAT 'for the first time ever' (as the young Sam couldn't remember the actual first time his father had struck him in the face) and the cruelty and callousness of his father's words, added to the boy's loss of trust and respect in and for the man, had served to push one too many of the young Sam's buttons.

The sixteen year old boy had been hurt for the last time (or so the young Sam had thought).

Present day Dean watched with tear filled eyes as the sixteen year old Sam had come to the conclusion that if he left, for good, for forever, then he couldn't be the reason his big brother died, that he couldn't be the reason that anyone died. And he had hoped that by leaving that his big brother would realize that his only obligation to stay was gone and would also leave, leave hunting, find a better, safer, life where he was no longer tethered to his duty as a soldier or as the sole care giver of his younger brother. The young Sam honestly believed that his big brother, would be better off if he didn't have a kid brother to feel obligated, to love, to be responsible for. The boy was honestly beginning to feel like the whole world would be better off without him and it was heartbreaking because he always tried so hard to do good and to be good. But no matter what he did, it seemed like it was ALWAYS wrong, that it was NEVER 'good enough', that all of his attempts to prove he could 'matter' that he could 'make a good difference', were and always would be 'worthless'. It shattered Present day Dean's soul to witness how devastated the sixteen year old Sam had been as he came to the firm decision to finally leave for good with a heavily burdened heart and a glimmer of hope that by leaving he could be keeping his family, the world, his big brother, safe.

Present day Dean had watched helplessly as the sixteen year old Sam had gathered as much money as he could along with a small bag filled his belongings and had hopped on the first bus out of the state… A bus which was headed for L.A. California, but would also make a stop in Flagstaff, Arizona…

He had watched as the sixteen year old spent the first few days in Flagstaff struggling to find suitable shelter as even at sixteen he had not bulked up yet, hadn't yet grown to his massively behemoth height and size and he had been cursed with what would become eternally youthful looking features, so no one would let him rent a hotel room because they wouldn't even buy that he really was at least sixteen … Hell, some people had honestly thought that the boy wasn't a day over fourteen, if that and had outright laughed in his face when he tried to pass himself off as eighteen. All that money the boy had collected, was doing him no good.

It broke Present day Dean's heart to know that if the sixteen year old Sam's memory hadn't been wiped when he was fourteen, then the boy would have been able to remember that he could call Doctor Robert for help… But no… The boy had thought he was all alone in the world. He had even been afraid to contact Bobby Singer, for fear that the gruff hunter would turn him away in spite of his promise that he and his brother would always be welcome, all because of the bad blood between the gruff salvage yard owner and his father.

It broke Present day Dean's heart even more when he watched as the sixteen year old Sam had spent his first night in Flagstaff on the street. He had felt the sixteen year old's terror as he saw what sorts of things REALLY went on after dark in the red light district of a big city. The boy had spent the better part of his life living in areas like that but he had never actually realized that 'pimps' and 'hookers' were anything other than fiction created by crime dramas and Soap Operas on television. The boy had been nervous as scantly clad women (and some girls who couldn't have been older than him and some (as sad as it was) who were actually probably younger) standing at various street corners, had offered themselves up to him with quotes on the prices of the 'services' that they provided, without caring about how obviously young he was. He had politely declined each time and one 'pimp' had gotten in his face over his refusal, the man had barked at the teen "What?!.. My girl not good enough for you?!... You think a spoiled little rich kid like you can just come down here and look at my merchandise without having to pay?"

The boy hadn't even been trying to look at anything other than his shoes and the sidewalk. The sixteen year old hadn't been deluded enough to think that the man wouldn't be armed, so he had thought fast and took off running, getting himself off of those dangerous streets and closer to a more 'upscale neighborhood' where there were less 'pimps' and 'hookers' but still plenty of homeless people, and some of those homeless people had shared useful tips for survival with the boy.

An old women had suggested he find an empty building to squat in, an old man had suggested he go to the nearest homeless shelter as they hardly ever turned a child, who was clearly on their own, away.

But the sixteen year old had been too afraid that someone at an actual shelter might try to make him tell them his name, might try to find his family and that, that would lead to his family finding him, even if he used an alias. And the problem with squatting in an abandoned building was that other homeless people, mostly homeless people with families, with children, who were already occupying the few abandoned buildings he could find and he hadn't wanted to invade anyone else's space, he felt he had already done that enough in his life. So, the boy had spent his first full night in Flagstaff, sitting in an alley between two abandoned buildings surrounded by homeless people and feeling too wary of the new and unfamiliar situation to even really rest.

The boy's first actual day in Flagstaff turned hot and arid before it was even noon, causing the sixteen year old to sweat profusely. The boy looked down at himself and realized that spending the night in the alley hadn't exactly done his clothes any favors and now he also smelled. And… Well, it's not exactly like he had a place to shower and change his clothes, so now he was afraid to go into any sort of gas station or grocery store for food, because he knew he now looked and smelled like a street urchin which meant that he would more than likely get chased out of the store before he could prove that he did have money.

So, he had moved with the others who, like him, had found themselves on the streets and they had led him to a soup kitchen that offered him a small Styrofoam container of scrambled eggs and toast with a bottle of water, which he wolfed and gulped down eagerly because he hadn't exactly been eating very well before he had ended up leaving 'home', as he had been too depressed and too guilt ridden as he had honestly started to believe his father's venom more and more as time had progressed before it had all came to a head when his father had barked more hateful words at him before leaving on his last hunt. And the next morning when his big brother had left to get breakfast he had packed his bag and left.

Once he had finished his eggs and toast he felt worse than he had before he had left. Because, he had just upped and left without an honest explanation. And now he was feeling remarkably stupid, terribly foolish, because he could only imagine how his big brother might have reacted to returning to an empty hotel room and a note from his kid brother that had simply said he was old enough to be on his own now, that he didn't want to be a hunter and that he was leaving. A note that had all been almost nothing but lies. Because he wasn't really old enough to be on his own, he was seeing the proof of THAT right now and he honestly wouldn't have minded being a hunter if he hadn't had to face the very real possibility of watching his brother die every time they went up against some ghost or monster. If his father had just been able to understand that if he had gotten Dean far from the life of a hunter, then his youngest son would have gladly done anything and everything to be "daddy's PERFECT little soldier", even following orders without question, so long as Dean never had to go up against another monster, that could rip him to shreds, ever again. And the last bit had only been a partial truth, because obviously he had left… But… He hadn't really wanted to leave, he had only taken off because he had honestly believed that, that's what would be best for Dean and their father.

The sixteen year old Sam, could only hope and pray that his big brother wouldn't hate him too much over his decision to leave. But still he'd rather his big brother be ALIVE and hating him rather than dead because of him.

He had to remember WHY he was doing this. That he was doing this for his family, for the world, for Dean. To protect Dean, to keep him safe. To hopefully push Dean out of hunting for good and thus saving Dean from the life of a hunter, saving Dean from dying in their FATHER'S war.

On the sixteen year old Sam's third actual day in Flagstaff, the boy found himself very dehydrated as the temperature of the desert continued to climb and the even hotter and drier days of summer grew more near. He had gone to a park because one of the homeless people who had taken him under their wing had told him that he could always use the public restrooms there to change his clothes and clean himself up a little, that way he could feel a bit more at ease with at least going into a gas station to buy himself a bottle of water and some food, as the one meal and one bottle of water a day that he was allowing himself to accept from the soup kitchen obviously wasn't enough to keep his growing body functioning properly in this sort of heat. While he was at the park he observed a few 'normal' families and found that he envied their obviously well-loved children. He wanted that. Without any strings or obligations attached to tie either side down or hold either side back. Love was supposed to be unconditional, it was supposed to be supportive… It was supposed to be real… But apparently he was never going to receive that 'real love' that he yearned for, that his soul ACHED for.

He had been in Flagstaff for three days… THREE and his big brother and father BOTH are some of the best hunters out there, they know how to track someone or something down, no matter how elusive they're (or it's) being. He knows that they should have found him by now. That is IF they were even looking… If… IF, they even cared to look. That train of thought made a whole new level of depression start churning in his depths, causing his stomach to sour.

Maybe his family wasn't looking for him..

Maybe they were even happy he was finally gone…

That he was no longer around to burden either of them…

No… He didn't want to go back home… He didn't…

Did he?

He couldn't… He wouldn't.

No… He would not go back home. He did not want to go back home.

But it would be nice to know that his family cared enough to find him and try to talk him into it.

Right… Wishful thinking…

If they had found him, there wouldn't be any 'trying' to 'talk' him into anything, if they wanted him back, they would FORCE him to go back without even caring what he had to say.

BUT.. As bad as that would be… At least he would know that they had still cared enough to find him.

He choked down a sob and left the park without caring about even trying to go anywhere to buy himself anything to eat or drink.

He no longer cared about trying to find a safe place to rest.

What was the point?

Why was he even still alive?

Why hadn't he just ended it already?

Ending it would finally guarantee that his family, that his big brother would always be safe.

His family, the world, everyone would be better off without him taking in their much needed oxygen, he was a waste of space, a waste of air. He was a fat, slow, weak, useless, worthless failure. And he'd be doing the entire world a favor.

The world would be better off if he was dead… His big brother, would be better off if he was dead.

His eyes were filled with tears as he walked to a bridge that ran across "Walnut Canyon". The bridge was far enough off the ground that a fall (a jump) from this high up would surely (hopefully) kill him.

He fights back bitter sobs of grief. This was for the best and he's not a baby. At the very least he's going to meet his death like a man.

He climbs up on the bridge's concrete railing and turns to face the road (it will be easier if he doesn't have to look down, to see the sprawling expanse of nothingness between him and death), he's just going to close his eyes, spread his arms and do a 'backwards swan dive' right into the abyss of death. It'll be easy.

It should be easier than this.

He takes a deep breath and closes his eyes… Any minute now he'll be ready… Ready to let go of the railing.

Ready to fall (jump) to his death.

But then he hears the sqreeching sound of a vehicle slamming on it's brakes and then a *thud* and a whine, a whimper.

The sound of animal that's been hurt and a tug of compassion forces him to open his eyes.

A golden retriever is limping alongside the road, clearly injured and the vehicle that clipped him is nowhere to be seen. Someone just hit the poor dog and hadn't even cared to stop to see if the poor animal was alright. Whoever just hit the dog had just left the poor animal to possibly die. And from what he could see the dog had no collar. Which meant that someone had most likely abandoned him or her.

He knew how the dog felt.

There was no one around to care about the injured animal, except him.

The very least he could do was climb back over the railing and check to see how bad the poor dog's injuries were.

So, he climbed back over and carefully approached the injured dog.

His heart was broken as he found that the dog was exceptionally friendly and automatically happy to show unconditional affection even to a stranger, even right after he had been hurt so badly.

Who could be cruel enough to abandon such a perfectly sweet and loving dog?

Who could be cruel enough to just hit such a beautiful animal and then leave it to die without even stopping to check and see what sort of damage they'd done?

The sixteen year old Sam's eyes filled up with tears again… This time he was overcome with sadness for this poor animal that clearly needed someone to love him. To take care of him.

He looked the dog over and was happy to find that the dog only had a sprained leg and that nothing was broken and there didn't seem to be any internal bleeding, proving that the dog had only been clipped by the car that hit him.

The dog was extremely lucky not to even have any broken bones after being even just clipped by a car.

He knew he couldn't just abandon the poor dog. The dog needed him.

And maybe… Maybe he needed the dog too.

They were both kindred spirits after all.

Both of them had essentially been abandoned and both of them had pretty much been left to die without anyone to even care what about what happened to them.

Yeah, he knew that it was unfair to think that his father had abandoned him, had left him to die, when he was the one who ran away… But he knows that his father knows what he did… and he knows that the second the man finds out that he's runaway that his father will know WHY he ran away.

And he also knows that the man will never own up to having done something wrong.

So the sixteen year old also knows that he's not exactly wrong to think that way… And that makes him feel even worse than he had when he had been feeling when he was standing on the outside of the bridge's railing, ready to jump off.

But none of that stuff matters now. His past doesn't matter now.

Because right now there's a dog that's looking at him with all the unconditional love it's heart can give shining through it's eyes. And that dog needs him.

He thinks again of how lucky the dog is to not have any broken bones. Of how lucky HE is that the dog hadn't had any broken bones because then there would have been nothing he could have done for the poor dog. How the dog escaping injuries that he wouldn't have been able to take care of had probably just saved BOTH of their lives. Had just saved HIS life.

He thinks 'Bones' will be a good name for the dog. For HIS dog.

"Hey boy." He says soothingly as he gently pets the dog "I'm gonna take care of you from now on. Okay?", and then he gathers the dog into his arms says "Let's get you home." and starts to carry him away from the bridge.

He gets about five miles away from the bridge when he realizes that he has no 'home' to take Bones to.

He knows that there's other homeless people who live on the streets that have dogs (and he's no longer in denial about the fact that he IS in fact a homeless person who lives on the streets)… But he doesn't want to be like that.

Bones is HIS dog now and he wants HIS dog to have a home.

So, he keeps walking, ignoring the strain on his back from carrying a dog that weighs more than fifty pounds and looks for some kind of suitable shelter for him and HIS dog to call home.

He's gone about seventeen miles down an unnamed dirt road, when he sees it… Some people may think it's odd that grass can grow so high and green in a place that gets as hot as Arizona, but Flagstaff is a magical place, an Oasis of divine nature where there is a vast forest and plentiful lakes, all in the shadow of a snow-capped mountain… The grass has overgrown here but despite all of the overgrowth , he can just barely make it out. It looks like some sort of small, abandoned metal building of some kind.

Curiosity and a need for rest draws him closer.

It looks like it used to be a portable office. The kind sometimes used at construction sites or at logging sites. There's even still an old road sign on the outside of the door that says "Work crew ahead.", which made no sense unless one of the construction workers who had used this office had, had a sense of humor.

He warily opened the door. The inside smelled musty, but other than that the mobile home-like building was structurally sound and decently livable.

Upon further inspection he found that there were four separate rooms, a bathroom that had two toilet stalls, two sinks and even two shower stalls, a full kitchen complete with an old electric stove and old refrigerator that were right out of nineteen seventy-two, a room just off of the kitchen which seemed like it had probably once been used as a reception area and a room just off of that which had probably been the office of the site manager back in the day.

There were still old desks in both the office and the reception area and a few odds and ends that had been left behind by whoever had worked in the office.

The most intriguing had been the shoe box that was filled with postcards.

Once he finished searching the inside and deemed it as 'safe' to live in, the sixteen year old boy called his new dog by his name for the first time and was happy that the dog eagerly responded, then he told 'Bones' to 'sit' and 'stay' while he checked out the outside and the dog had actually listened.

The sixteen year old explored through the tall grass and kept a look out for snakes and scorpions as he walked around the perimeter of the building and then ventured a little further out to get a feel of how visible or invisible the building was on each side. After all, he couldn't risk someone finding the building or HIM. He found that the area around the building had apparently been used as an impromptu dumping ground for at least twenty years (unless someone was willingly and purposefully, throwing away things that could be valuable collectables and antiques from nineteen seventy-six) and realized, that if no one had noticed this place was still here by now, then no one probably ever would.

Feeling secure in the knowledge that if he lived here he would remain undiscovered, that he and Bones would be 'safe' here, the boy settled down in the floor next to Bones and began to really assess the dog's injury. Bones' sprained leg would definitely need to be wrapped, so the sixteen year old dug through his small bag and pulled out an old shirt that he didn't mind tearing because it was too small anyway and tore it into several long, thin strips, which he used to wrap his dog's leg so that Bones could now at least walk around without him causing further damage to the area around the sprain. Then he laid down on the floor and let Bones snuggle up beside him and the boy and his dog eventually drifted off to sleep, both obviously feeling more loved and at peace than either of them had felt in a long time…

The next day, the second he woke up, the sixteen year old realized that he had to find a way to get food for Bones because he had no idea how long it had been since Bones had eaten, which made him instantly feel guilty because he hadn't thought about how he was going to keep HIS dog fed, sooner… He knew he had to start being a better pet owner because it wouldn't be fair to Bones if he kept slacking off on his new responsibilities.

So, he told Bones to 'stay' then he walked down the dirt road and cut through the trees and found that he came out to a road near a lake, he looked to his right and saw a sign that suggested that there was a gas station nearby, so he walked about six miles to get there and bought a small bag of dog food, a six pack of 'Mr. Pibb', a big bag of 'Funions' and two liter sized bottles of water along with two medium sized bowls and made sure to ask the lady behind the counter nicely if she would double bag everything, because he was walking home.

He felt happier than he had in a really long time when he got back and opened the door to the place he was staying, because as he opened the door he realized that this place… That this place was HIS…

He had a place of his own… His own place.

And his own dog.

All he was missing was a white picket fence and he'd be living the 'American Dream'… Except… He'd still be living it without his big brother. He wished Dean could be here with him right now, that he and Dean could have THIS… All of this.. Together, because Dean deserved to get to have his own place too.. Dean deserved to get to have a great dog, a great friend, like Bones, too.

The sixteen year old tried to keep his sullen thoughts from making him sad. Because he had left his big brother to help keep him safe. To protect Dean from the invisible monster that still haunted his nightmares from time to time.

He had left because Dean would be better off without him…

The sixteen year old shook himself from his 'pity party' type thoughts and got to work setting the bowls in the floor and filling one half full with food and the other, with half of one of the one liter bottles of water then he called bones over to the bowls and showed him where his food was.

Bones had obviously been without food for a while because the second he saw the bag of dog food he gotten extremely excited, wagging his tail so vigorously his whole body wagged with it and then he had started trembling and whining as the food was actually poured into the bowl and the second he was called to the bowls he had bolted over in a flash with a clear expression of gratitude written all over his face as he literally 'dove' into his food.

Sam had just sat off to the side watching as Bones happily licked both of his bowls clean.

"Filling better now that ya got a full belly, don't ya?"

The dog responded with a happy wiggle of his whole body.

"Who's got a full belly?" Sam asked playfully and Bones gave an excited yip in reply.

"That's right… You got a full belly…" The sixteen year old cooed in 'baby talk' to the dog who made his way over to the boy with a happily wagging tail (and body) and nudged up under the boys hand with a firm insistence that he wanted to be petted, which Sam had happily obliged.

"You're a good boy Bones… Yes you are… Yes you are…" The boy told his dog as he gave the dog's ears a thorough scratching much to the dog's contentment.

Soon, Bones had settled down next to Sam and both the boy and his best friend just sat there both happily enjoying the calm and quiet of the, so far, still early morning, for a while.

When Sam finally decided to move, Bones was right at his side, it seemed like someone would need a crowbar to separate that dog from the boy's side now… The dog was obviously just as attached to the kid as the kid was to him.

Sam took a few minutes to eat a few 'Funions' and drink half of a 'Mr. Pibb' then he went about tiding up… It wasn't about the regiment of chores his father had constantly made him endure… No… This was about this place being HIS and him wanting HIS place to actually be a bit cleaner than it was.

He gathered up what few bits of trash he could find and bagged them up in one of the plastic grocery sacks he had gotten at the gas station then put that bag under the kitchen sink to keep trash in until it was full. Then he used what was left of the shirt he had torn up to use for wrapping Bones' leg, to dust off the desks, the kitchen counter and to wipe out the kitchen cabinets. Once he was finished getting the three main rooms of his tiny new abode clean he found that he needed to make use of the bathroom, so he took two other remnants of his old torn shirt, one to use for wiping down one of the toilet seats and the other just to use for wiping, wiping, and when he was finished he pushed on the silver handle out of force of habit and almost had a heart attack when the toilet actually flushed.

"No way.." He whispered and rushed to the faucets and turned the knobs on one of them to find that the building somehow still had the water turned on… The water came out a little muddy and rusty at first, but that's because the pipes had gone so long without being used and it wouldn't take but a few minutes to get the water running clear… He wondered what else might still be on and rushed to the light switch… Unfortunately there was no electricity. That was okay. He could live with that. He had actually lived with less than that, so he'd be fine taking what he was lucky enough to get.

He did a bit more exploring and found a small box of tacks hidden on the top shelf of one of the kitchen cabinets and he uses a few of the tacks to put the postcards up on the wall… He finally has a HOME and he wants to decorate it with anything he can find that he might like. Then he remembers the road sign outside of the door and hangs it on the inside of the door, just because this place was HIS now and he could. Now he had postcards decorating almost the whole inside of what had once been the office building's reception area, but was now HIS, HOME'S living room…

The food he had bought for Bones had only lasted till the next morning. Which meant that he would need to return to the gas station for more.

He knew he would have to find the nearest grocery store because all the gas station had to offer was a small bag of dog food that would only last two feedings for a dog of Bones' size and he couldn't keep affording to buy such high priced bags that only provided so little, so he told Bones to 'stay' and headed out once more, this time using a short cut to the gas station that he had found on his way home yesterday.

The sixteen year old went to the gas station and asked the woman behind the counter where the nearest grocery store was.

"Hey, weren't you in here yesterday?" The same attendant from the day before asked. "I only ask because we don't get very many 'regulars' out here, ya know?"

"Yeah, I'm new here.." Sam had replied.

"Well, that's kind of obvious. No one who's actually from around here would wear long sleeves and all those layers in this heat."

The sixteen year old Sam wore long sleeves pretty much all the time because almost all of the shirts he owned were long sleeved and he was too poor to buy anything else and he wore layers, because of how subconscious he was about his body. Part of him still thought he was fat, while another part of him thought that he was 'scrawny' and 'wirey' and 'ugly'… He was very certain about the UGLY part, no matter if he was fat or scrawny, so he hated it when he felt like either he or his clothes were being scrutinized. He knew he was poor, pretty much destitute really. And he knew he looked the part, he didn't need someone reminding him of that along with all of his issues with his body by pointing out his clothes.

But he took the, what had felt like an, insult in stride and gave the (kind of bitchy, if anyone were to ask his opinion) attendant a fake grin as he said "Yeah, total newbie to desert living. So do ya think you could help me out? I need to get food for my dog and all you guys have is the small bags of dog food and my dog's not exactly little.."

"Oh, yeah?... What kind of dog do you have?" The lady asked as she reached for a small notepad and a pen.

"He's a Golden Retriever."

"That's cool.. I've heard they're a really good breed of dog… Okay.." She said as she took the pen to the paper and began to draw a map.. "The road right out in front here, is Lake Mary Road…" The rest of whatever she was saying was drowned out…

Lake Mary Road… Well, that sure as hell was some sort of sign… It was like his mom had been looking out for him, from up in Heaven.

He thought that maybe his mom had maybe even sent Bones to him because she had known that he had really needed something to 'hold onto', that he had really needed a friend. And even with as sad as he felt right now, these thoughts made him beam at the attendant with a real smile. Not for the gas station attendant's benefit (although he didn't think she was actually bitchy anymore, just probably, socially awkward), but because he was actually happy enough to actually smile a REAL smile for once.

Having Bones and a 'real', "home" of his very own and thinking that maybe his mom had helped him find these things, made him smile.

He took the hand drawn map from the attendant and looked down at it, hoping that he could figure it out since he had zoned out before she really got to the verbal directions.

Turned out finding the nearest grocery store wasn't hard, it was only a mile away and almost a straight shot, after he crossed a very busy interstate. Getting a big bag of dog food across that death trap hadn't been very easy (in fact it had been downright terrifying, he had almost gotten plowed over by a Semi… Apparently irony knew no bounds, just when he starts wanting to try to live, he almost dies..), but he had ended up making it HOME in one piece and the good news was, was that he wouldn't have to buy food for Bones again for at least a month as he'd gotten the biggest bag of dog food the grocery store had, had to offer. Now he could just continue making trips to the gas station for the few smaller things that he himself needed to survive.

About an hour after he had returned HOME, Bones started growling and went over to the door then looked up at Sam then back at the door.

The sixteen year old strained his ears to get a feel for what was causing Bones' unease and heard a faint racket… It sounded like some kind of metallic *POP!*, then there was a *CLANK!*, like something big and metallic had just been tossed off of a trailer, then he heard the faint rumble of an engine that grew even more distant till he could no longer hear it, a few seconds later, Bones settled down . The noises had been far enough away that he didn't think he had to worry about being discovered and he knew that the land around his home had obviously been used as impromptu (illegal) dumping grounds in the past so it would stand to reason that even more trash would be dumped pretty much on 'his lawn' over the course of time, he could live with that… Besides maybe someone would dump something he could actually use… One man's trash was another man's treasure after all…

So, he started checking 'his yard' every evening for 'new' things and had come to possess someone else's old couch, someone else's old bed, someone else's old coffee table… all of which had been in decently useable condition when they had just been dumped almost right on his door step. And it was basically raining 'Mana From Heaven' when he found a box in the parking lot of the gas station that someone must have accidently knocked out of their vehicle as it was filled with a few blankets and two pillows.

~0~

He had been in Flagstaff for six days… He had had Bones for three, long enough for Bones' leg to heal and long enough for him to start to realize what a big responsibility taking care of another living being was, especially since he was getting low on cash. He had been having to the gas station every day to stock up on various supplies as there was only so much he could carry and every day the same woman, 'Carmen' according to her name tag, was always behind the counter. Turned out she really was actually nice, she really had been just socially awkward but now that Sam had been interacting with her every day she had begun to come out of that awkwardness and he and the blonde, thirty year old woman had quickly become friends. There were even times when Carmen would 'discount' items for him as she had figured out that he was on his own and short on cash, but she had sworn that she wouldn't tell anyone, because she had, had a crappy childhood and had wished several times that she had have just ran away when she had, had the chance, so she knew how he felt… She said that if it had been bad enough to make a seemingly good kid like him run away, then it must have been really bad.

On the fourth day he went to the gas station Carmen had asked him if he needed a way to earn some extra cash, because she was looking for someone to help out on her small wheat farm that had been struggling to make a comeback after almost being bankrupted back in the fifties, but her family had managed to hold onto it and pass it to her when they died. She said she only needed a little help with the farm for a few hours each day while she worked at the gas station because she couldn't afford to hire someone full time as the farm wasn't very profitable and her pay from the gas station was just barely enough to take on some part time help who wouldn't mind a whole bunch of difficult work for very little pay and Sam had gladly accepted because he really needed the cash if he was going to be able to stand on his own two feet much longer.

Sam had been to wary to tell Carmen where he was staying (he was young, not stupid) so he agreed to come to the gas station for Carmen to take to him her place on for the first day so he could figure out where it was and if it was even feasible for him to be able to work there depending on how long it would take to walk there from where his hidden residence was.

It turned out that her small wheat farm was about nine miles away from his home, which made it about an hour and a half's walk away from his home if he decided to keep the job and he had no problems with waking up three hours early to feed Bones, get ready and make the walk to work, so he was definitely keeping it.

Carmen had been widowed only four months ago during a and since then she's been struggling to make ends meet even more than she had been while her husband was still alive and Carmen hadn't been kidding when she said that she needed help around the farm.

The wheat fields looked reasonably well tended but the areas around the house, the barn and the silos were deplorable.

The barn needed re-roofing, the house had broken and rotting pieces of wood all over the surface of the front porch and the entire house needed to be re-roofed, and the silos needed to just be torn down because there was no way to save them…

He was just sixteen… What the hell did he know about re-roofing buildings or rebuilding porches or tearing down silos?

He had come here thinking he could handle whatever work was thrown his way… But now he wasn't so sure.

And then… Carmen started telling him exactly what it was she needed him to do around the farm.

Apparently the woman's farm was so unsuccessful because she was bad about procrastination, because the job description didn't have anything to do with rickety porches, weak roofs, or silos that should be torn down… No… He was supposed to work on a piece of her land that she had sectioned off for an organic vegetable garden…. She honestly believed that 'Organic Vegies' were going to be the wave of the future and was surely the wisest thing for her to invest in now, before it became big.

Okay… So… Carmen was also apparently a bit of a hippy.

But Sam could live with that so long as Carmen paid him in cash and NOT in produce. (Although he wouldn't outright refuse it if she paid him in food, he really was that desperate. But it was all about keeping his game face on and not letting her in on just how desperate he was.)

Then Carmen showed him the five acres she was planning to turn into an organic garden.

He'd rather re-roof the barn, the house, fix the porch and tear down the silos than clear all of the weeds from five whole acres or have to use a non-motorized, hand push tiller to try to work the rock hard ground of that five acres.

Was Carmen naive or something?

She'd never get anything to grow on this patch of land…

But, hey… Money is money and she said she'd pay him two dollars an hour plus feed him dinner each evening when she got back from working at the gas station, she had even said that he could bring Bones with him so that Bones wouldn't be stuck inside wherever he was staying with no air conditioning because the summer was about to start getting hotter and he couldn't refuse the opportunity she was offering to him.

He spent his first day of work, breaking his back, and hadn't even tilled a full acre… This was going to take FOREVER! When Carmen returned home she said he understood his frustration, but once things started to take more shape out there and he actually started seeing the progress he was making, he'd finally understand what kind of potential the land held and then he'd feel proud that he had been the one to start helping to mold and form that potential.

Carmen fed him fried chicken, corn, mashed potatoes and sweet tea and had even given him food to take home.

He got back home before the sun had set on that first day, but Carmen said that he shouldn't always expect that because the hours she worked at the gas station sometimes varied, but he didn't mind working late so long as he could take Bones with him.

The next day he woke up early, packed a plastic zipper baggie of dog food for Bones and a small plastic bowl in his bagpack, got dressed and took Bones with him and met Carmen as she opened up the gas station, he bought a cheap leash and collar for Bones then told Carmen he was heading out to her place to work, and Carmen said there was a spare key to her house under her 'Welcome' mat so he could get in and get himself some water or use the bathroom.

Bones did remarkably well on the leash and was perfectly well-mannered as he sat in the shade and watched, the sixteen year old Sam work.

That day, Sam had managed to till the rest of the acre he had started the day before and now he saw it…

The potential that Carmen had spoken of.

Under the top layer of rock hard, dried out dirt, was soft, moist, good, fertile land, the land just needed turning and if Carmen planted seeds as soon as the land was ready, then by fall there would be a bounty of fresh tomatoes, carrots, lettuce and other produce for Carmen to sell at a Farmer's Market for some really decent profits.

And Carmen had been right. He did feel proud that he was the one helping to shape the land that would help Carmen finally be able to start being more financially secure. He was actually helping to make a difference for the better in someone else's life… And that felt like it was something to be proud of.

That night when Carmen returned home Sam had ended up staying a little longer than he had intended as he and Carmen had gotten to talking and laughing over pizza and some beers (if he was old enough to be on his own, he could make the call on whether he could have a beer or not) and it had felt nice to be with someone who actually SAW him and who actually HEARD him.

He wasn't invisible when he was around her. And that had helped boost his mood and had made him finally feel settled into this new life he had carved out for himself.

She let him take home the leftover pizza and two beers and had whispered conspiringly even though there was no one but Bones to hear them "But 'shh' don't let anyone know I let you have these.", and he had replied with a full belly laugh… Because… Who would he tell?

~0~

He had been in Flagstaff for eleven days and had been working for Carmen for four days now and he already had a set routine down pat , he was already at a point where it was easy to just automatically get up, get Bones a day's worth of food packed up, hook the leash to Bones' collar and walked straight to work. The sixteen year old Sam had been really good at adapting to almost anything, almost instantly when he was given room to grow and flourish.

And life was finally treating Sam right for a change, so the sixteen year old finally had plenty of room to grow and flourish.

When he got to Carmen's she was still there.

"Oh, yeah… I forgot to tell you yesterday that I had today off from working at the gas station… But hey… Now we can both work on getting the garden ready, together if you don't mind sticking around today even though I'm off and then we can get more work done in less time."

"Yeah, sure… I don't mind helping out around here even on your days off from the gas station."

"Really?" at Sam's nod Carmen grinned and replied "Awesome… Okay… Let's get to work."

He and Carmen worked side by side, all throughout the day, she had pushed the tiller and he had pulled the weeds and when they were getting close to done for the day, Carmen apologized that she was going to have to leave Sam to do the rest so she could go get cleaned up and get dinner ready and Sam had said that, that was okay. He spent about another hour and a half out tilling another small strip of land when Carmen called him out to her back yard for dinner.

"We're having dinner out on the back patio tonight I hope you don't mind…" Carmen called from the open sliding glass doors.

"Yeah, it's fine." Sam replied as he took a seat at the patio table. It was a beautiful evening despite the clouds and lightening visible in the distance, the sky above him was clear. The breeze was cool and setting sun was making the wheat fields shine like spun gold for as far as Sam could see. He felt like he was a thousand miles from nowhere as he looked at those fields.

Which reminded him of how far from his old 'home' he was. But he couldn't allow that to get him down. He had to live as best as he could for as long as he could. He owed it to Bones, who had saved his life, to do that. He owed it to Carmen, who had become his friend, to do that.

A bowl of salad appeared on the table in front of him, startling him out of his revelry, then a cup of coffee appeared under his nose and he could hear the smile in Carmen's soft as she said that he looked like he had needed it.

And he had needed it. He had completely zoned out due to exhaustion and hadn't even realized it. He took a few sips of the coffee and feeling more awake, he looked up to give Carmen his thanks as she finished putting the main course and a pitcher of sweet tea on the table.

But when he looked up, his breath caught in his chest. His words caught in his throat.

Carmen was a vision of beauty in a pale yellow, sleeveless dress that came down to just above her knees. Her blonde hair was put up into a sensually lose twist, that allowed a few lose tendrils of hair to frame her face and bring out her sun-kissed skin and jade green eyes.

The second he realized how beautiful she was, he felt his cheeks heat up as his face turned pink with an embarrassed blush.

But Carmen didn't seem to notice his embarrassment as she began to talk about how good it felt to have made so much progress today, which led to a full out conversation. There was a lot of talking and laughing and Sam was feeling happy…. But he was also feeling like something was different.

Something was different about Carmen. Something was different about both of them. It was like they were both starting to recognize a need. That they needed something from each other. Even if they didn't yet know what that might be.

There was a difference in Carmen's laughter.

There was a softness, in her eyes.

And on the air there was a hunger that even a boy could recognize.

The summer wind was all around them.

There was nothing between them but the gathering night.

There was a gentle hand on his arm that was leading him inside, then he found himself laying down on the floor in front of a lit fireplace and they were kissing.

When Carmen broke the kiss and trailed her hands downwards and began to undo the the button of his jeans, Sam gulped and huffed out a nervous breath as he told Carmen that he's never… Never..

And she softly whispered "That's alright." as she freed his growing proof of arousal from the confines of it's denim cocoon.

Then he watched her weather worn hands of leather, turn to velvet in a touch as she took his manhood in hand.

The sixteen year gasped in awe as he paid rapt attention to the way the moonlight seemed to dance over their combined sweat and played with the shadows of the lacey under things Carmen was wearing, lighting Carmen up with a serene glow and making her one of the most beautiful things he had ever seen. Then she worked her way down his body and used her experienced and talented mouth to coax him to the edge of climax making him gasp for an entirely different reason. Then she teasingly pulled away and then their bodies were crashing together the way the bodies of lovers do and flickers of lightening and rumbles of thunder grew closer as they reached their climaxes together… And it had been beautiful… But for some reason he sixteen year old couldn't keep tears from gathering in his eyes. Something about achieving sexual release, just felt… Wrong.. somehow and he couldn't explain why, not even to himself.

He felt humiliated and turned his face away so Carmen couldn't see. So she wouldn't think it was something that she had done. No… She had been perfect… Gentle and loving, and he was always going to remember the moments they had just shared together with fondness, for forever.

But Carmen had noticed his tears and was so good to him as she kissed each of his tears away and told him that it was okay, that it was nothing to be embarrassed about. In fact… She had told him that one of the reasons she had felt so drawn to him was because he had such a beautiful and sensitive soul and then they had proceeded to make love again and again… Until, without realizing, they had burned both ends of the night and the sun was, rising, heralding the start of a new day.

The sixteen year old was thoroughly sated and content, but also, thoroughly exhausted. He wanted to curl up and sleep for an eternity, but he knew he needed to get up, because he needed to take care of his dog and Carmen needed to get to work.

Carmen gave a disgruntled groan as she stretched her overtired body… "I don't think I can walk, let alone go in to work today.." she said with a playful waggle of her eyebrows.

Sam huffed out a laugh.. "I gotta go check on Bones… Then I gotta… gotta… I guess I should get some more work done…"

Carmen shook her head and gently grabbed his wrist "Go ahead and check on your pup… But then come back… Cause me and you… we're spending the day sleeping and I'm not taking 'No' for answer cause I'm not having you pass out on me.. Not when I'm gonna need you very, very, conscious later, if you get what I mean…" she whispered the last bit in a husky voice as she wrapped her long and very flexible legs around his waist.

He might be exhausted from a hard day's worth of work (and a hard night's worth of other things) and a lack of a restful night's sleep, but he was still sixteen and his body responded to Carmen's promise of more love making later, in kind.

Blushing at his obvious arousal he made his way to the kitchen that his dog had claimed as his own…

"Hey boy.." Sam whispered as he gave Bones a scratch to his ears then made sure his dog had plenty of food and water then went back in to where Carmen was waiting for him.

He and Carmen spent a couple of still early morning, hours dozing by the fireplace, the fire had died hours ago so now the room had grown cool as the storm that had moved through had caused the temperature to drop by almost thirty degrees and the sky was still overcast, keeping the temperature at a nice level of coolness.

It was cool enough for him and Carmen to draw closer and cuddle tightly together under the throw that she had tugged of the couch and tossed over them.

Her hands roamed playfully up and down the rippled plains of his muscular chest and abdomen.

"You know?.." She whispered huskily against his neck as she gave heed to her passion and let her hand trail lower "You shouldn't wear so many layers anymore… It covers up this beautiful work of art…" her hand came back up and caressed his chiseled abs.

"It's not… I'm not.."

"Yes, Sam… You are… Your body is absolutely, magnificently, amazingly, beautiful and whoever made you doubt that was wrong, Sam… They were wrong about you… You are a very strong and handsome young man and you are only going to grow even more strong and handsome as time moves on. Please don't ever let anyone make you believe any different… Okay?"

"Okay.." He breathed with a tearful whisper… No one had ever told him that his body was anything other than weak, fat, slow or ugly and it made his heart soar with the confidence that the compliment gave him, but it also caused his heart to ache just a little because it was like salve being put on a burn, a cast being put on a break, it hurt, but it was a healing type of hurt…

Carmen was helping his broken heart, his broken soul, to heal.

They both gave heed to their passion, they rushed headlong in the wind both finding a place where both their dreams had been hiding as they let themselves fall together over the edges of their climaxes.

When the firey lust in control of their libidos finally released it's hold over them, they showered together and had a light brunch then spent a two hours cozied up on the couch with Bones at their feet… Around noon, Carmen told Sam that she wanted to take him and Bones out to do something, but it was a surprise. She had said it in a cheerful tone, but she had seemed sad for some reason.

So they both got dressed, loaded Bones into the back of Carmen's truck and when they got into town, Sam closed his eyes and let Carmen guide him wherever she was taking them and when he opened his eyes, he was standing inside of a bank.

He suddenly felt nervous and leaned in to whisper "We're not here to rob the place, are we?"

"No, goofball!" She said with a playful swat to his arm. "We're here to open you an interest bearing saving's account… That way you have a little something put away to take care of your future…"

"What d'ya mean?.. Like College?... I wasn't exactly planning on going back to school this coming fall…"

"It'll be for whatever you want, Sam… So long as you promise not to touch it till you're at least eighteen years old."

"Why eighteen?"

"Because the money is for your extended future… Not next week or a month from now.. But for years from now when you have an idea what you might really want out of life. See, by then the account will have had a chance to gain interest… So, you'll have a good amount of money to invest in whatever endeavor you might choose when you officially become an adult.."

"You make it sound like I'm still just a kid…"

"Oh, sweetie… You are still just a kid… And me… I'm a dirty, dirty, old woman, who shouldn't have played with fire… You're too good… Too innocent for me to keep debauching…"

"You haven't… I mean…. It's not like that… You don't have anything to feel guilty about… I wanted, needed to be with you last night and this morning..."

"Oh, Sam.. I wish you were two years older or that I was a whole lot younger. But as it is.. You're just sixteen and I can't let myself keep taking advantage of you.."

"Wait… What are you saying?... Are you?... Are we?..."

"I'm saying that I'm going to help you open an interest bearing saving's account for your future, I'm going to put half of every cent that I owe you for the work you've done into that account and then I'm going to take you and drop you off at the gas station and pay you the rest of what I owe you… It'll be almost like any other day when I've given you a ride back to town… Except you can't come back to work tomorrow because I won't be able to keep myself from losing control if I'm around you and you're too young for me, Sam… You're way too young for what I let myself do to you.."

Carmen had tears in her eyes as she whispered these things to him… But in a weird way… Sam wasn't feeling as broken hearted as he thought he should be…

Because he hadn't expected to spend the rest of his life with her or something like that… No… He had planned for her to be a great memory that he could look back on fondly and nothing more.

He smiled and gave her a curt nod then hugged her and whispered his thanks for everything she had done for him, for everything she had given him, for everything she had taught him and let her help him open a saving's account for his future then he let her drop him and Bones off at the gas station and said goodbye to her, for what he believed would be the last time…

And the next day, he had a very pissed off big brother on his door step..

His big brother hadn't wanted to hear anything he had, had to say. He only wanted the sixteen year old Sam's ass in the passenger seat of the Impala RIGHT NOW.. But the sixteen year old had held fast… He would not be moved unless his big brother promised to let him take Bones to his 'friend' Carmen up at the gas station and somehow, somehow he had gotten his big brother to relent and minutes later he was telling his home, his dog and his ex, goodbye for, for good this time, knowing that he wasn't ever going to see Carmen or Bones or his divinely obtained HOME, ever again.


	11. Chapter 6. Part 6.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

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> There are 4 more parts to "Chapter 6" after this..
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Present day Dean looked back on how he had taken Sam running away to Flagstaff so personally, constantly berating Sam over what would be the whole next year of the sixteen year old Sam's life with constant, underhanded, verbal jabs about how 'selfish' Sam had been, how 'ungrateful' and 'irresponsible' and how he had 'abandoned' his family when he had run away the way he did… How the mere memory of Flagstaff brought back to his attention a little more than three years ago, had caused him to hurt Sam in one of the worst possible ways… And he thought of how he would never be able to forgive himself now and wondered how in the hell Sam could even stand to be near him, how Sam could even stand to hear the sound of his voice… All the times he had basically called Sam 'ungrateful' were coming back to haunt him… Now that he was seeing things and actually understanding things for the very first time, all he could do was chastise himself… Because… When had he ever shown any sort of 'gratitude' for the simple fact that Sam had come back, time and time again or had been there to COME BACK TO? When had he ever shown any kind of gratitude to Sam for sticking beside him even during the really bad moments when Sam could have, SHOULD have left his sorry ass?... Yeah, he gets that he could have left too… And that's the kicker. The thing that guts him the worst is that he could have left if he genuinely hadn't been happy with his relationship with Sam, yet he had basically forced Sam to shoulder the responsibility of appeasing him by staying, lest SAM be held up accountable for being a 'family abandoning traitor' that only wants to focus on his selfish wants and needs….

He was really in the mood to kick his Past self's ass for not seeing, for not getting, that Sam had been just sixteen years old back then and hadn't deserved to be treated like garbage just because he had run away from a life where he was constantly being either neglected or verbally, mentally, emotionally, spiritually and even sometimes physically abused.

No kid should ever have to go through that.

It pissed him off to no end as he watched over the course of the next few weeks of Past Sam's life how John's treatment of his sixteen year old son had steadily started getting worse and worse after Sam had been drug back from his escape attempt.

John's iron hard callousness had begun to crush the poor sixteen year old even more as John started taking shots at how he 'could no longer be trusted' now that he'd proven to be such a 'liability' and that 'he needed to toughen up because he couldn't just run away crying every time he so much as got his 'feelings' hurt'… And of course there was more than just the verbal assault… John toughened up Sam's 'training' regiments as well up to the point where Sam was running over a hundred laps each day even in one hundred twenty-eight degrees with no chance at stopping to hydrate. Present day Dean watched as Sam nearly collapsed into an exhausted heap several times only to have their 'father' threaten him with physical reprimand that would come not from a belt but from fists, thoroughly terrorizing the boy into forward momentum, once again,, were the sixteen year old would continue to run himself until he was even more ragged despite the steadily growing pain in his chest.

Present day Dean felt the color drain from his face.. Because when John had wiped Sam's memory of the rape he had also wiped Sam's memory of the heart condition that Doctor Robert had found and John, he had known, but obviously hadn't cared that he could actually KILL Sam by pushing him to 'train' so hard. Sam's own father had not even given a damn that he was putting everything that HE had wanted and needed over Sam's well-being, yet he was constantly belittling Sam over his (supposed) 'irresponsibility' as well as Sam's 'inability' to put his "PRIORITIES" in 'proper' order… BUT… The sad thing was… He knew deep within the core of his soul, that he was no better than John Winchester, because he had constantly put his "dad's" orders and 'the job' first over Sam so many times over the years, yet got pissed the hell off at Sam, got up on his high horse and used it to trample over Sam any time Sam so much as dared to even think about having a priority that didn't revolve around what he wanted or what he would 'allow', Sam to do or want… Just when had he become THAT guy?… Just when had he become John Winchester?...

He watched as the sixteen year old Sam had started growing more and more of a backbone. His time with Carmen had given him something… a feeling of confidence, of self-worth… And it was clear that John Winchester had been trying to stamp those things out at every opportunity…. But Sam had persevered and had begun to get in John's face more and more over every little thing. And Present day Dean finally understood… Sam had stopped trusting their father…

And for good reason.

Because now that Present day Dean stopped to think about it… To REALLY… THINK about it…

How many times had their father just dismissed good research in favor of doing things 'his own damn way'?

How many times had their father gone into or drug them all into something without being fully prepared?

There were so many hunters that wouldn't hunt with or around John Winchester because he was considered "Reckless" and "Dangerous" and "Liable to get them killed if he didn't turn on them and kill them himself"… All those people, couldn't have been wrong…. Hell, he had respected Bobby's opinion more than most back then, yet he had been so blind as to NEVER ONCE wonder just why… Why Bobby would cut ties with someone who had been his 'friend' for so long…. He hadn't even thought to question it, he had just followed along with what his father ordered of him, like a good little soldier.

How had he allowed himself to be so blind?

His vision became a haze of red as he watched as time and time again, his 'father' and his Past self belittled and berated Sam. It physically hurt to witness as bit by bit, more and more of what little self-worth Sam had managed to find for himself got torn away as the sixteen year old boy once more began to take his family's words and actions to heart.

Present day Dean suddenly realized that he and his father had basically been telling a sixteen year old boy who was already struggling with severe, yet untreated, depression, that he wasn't important enough to have anything he needed, wanted, thought, said or felt, have any kind of precedence, not even when continuously doing so had clearly been coming at the price of his physical, mental, emotional and spiritual health for years…. They had been basically telling Sam that if he couldn't be a 'good enough' soldier then that meant that he wanted him to be, then he was 'worthless' and didn't belong anywhere but on the outside looking in, that he had deserved to be alienated and ostracized and outcast from his family… And not because he was a 'black sheep' that didn't fit in.. But because he had been pure light that had been able to escape all the lines they kept drawing every single time a door of opportunity opened enough to give him a chance to escape their small minded, one sided street, world. They had basically been trying to snuff out all of Sam's light just so they could avoid all the ways it kept illuminating all of the reasons they never deserved to get to keep that light in their lives in the first place.

Steadily pulsing rage filled him as he watched as John drug them out on another hunt that he hadn't been fully prepared for. Another hunt where he dismissed Sam's research and hard work when Sam had been the one to dig up the grave all by himself because their 'father' had insisted that the twenty year old Dean should be the one to do a specialized incantation that was all in Latin, despite knowing that SAM was the one who was actually any good at Latin back then- Heck, it had taken him till after he got out of Hell to be able to recite a Latin Exorcism without having to look at a book… He still remembers that one demon bitch heckling him when he lost the page with the exorcism, how he had been irked by the fact that he would have to wait till Sam got there to do the exorcism right, and at that point in time he had been twenty-eight, freaking, years old and still hadn't been able to do a proper Latin Exorcism without having it right in front of him and he doesn't even want to think about how he hadn't even been able to properly pronounce an annunciate more than half of the words until he was twenty-six (He still hadn't even known GOD'S name in Latin was 'Christo' till Sam had told him a little over six years ago when they fought a crazy ass demon that had like crashing planes and killing everyone onboard just for kicks..), which were all things that as a HUNTER he should have been well versed in, but he hadn't been… And John frigging Winchester had known that and had still made Sam be the one to dig up the corpse while the one who had still been mispronouncing Ominus as Ominous and Sante' as Saint-A was the one performing a complicated Ritual that was all in Latin… Needless to say, the ritual went wrong in all kinds of bad ways and instead of the vengefully pissed off spirit of a devil worshiping, homicidal (even in death) psychopath, being neutralized enough to where they could torch his bones without becoming his next UNWILLING 'ritualistic sacrifices', the spirit had proven to be too strong and even more pissed off once it had been provoked by the improperly done ritual, as well as the younger Dean's snarky sarcasm and the 'fight' had winded up with everyone beaten all to hell before in the chaos of it all, SAM had just rolled with it and dumped most of the ritual stuff, SALT, peppermint OIL and LIT CANDLE included, right into the grave, right on top of the corpse the pissed off spirit used to belong to… The corpse and the vengeful spirit had gone up in flames… But had John Winchester admitted any wrong doing?, Had the man even made the attempt to so much as acknowledge how HE had so very obviously screwed up?.. Had their 'father' even so much as noticed that SAM had pretty much just saved all of their lives?... NO!.. No… John fucking Winchester had went off on SAM for the ritual going wrong, roaring like a pissed off lion and huffing like a pissed off bull as he verbally tore into SAM for how his 'incompetence' and 'irresponsibility' got all of them hurt and could have gotten them all killed…

Had John even been LISTENING to HIMSELF back then?... Because from what Present day Dean had just witnessed, JOHN had been the one to screw up the entire hunt and his own Past self had been the screw up the ritual all while Sam had probably been the only one who had at the very least tried to only be prepared with the proper research and weapons, but had also fought to save the family who would tell him to his face how obvious it was that he didn't give a damn about them, when in fact his family being there and in danger had been the only reason he had even fought at all… Because Past Dean might not have seen it, he had been knocked out by the high speed collision of his head against a tree, but Present day him was seeing things just fine… Sam had just wanted to lay there and let his own injuries get the better of him but then he had saw his family laying on the ground, hurt and knew that if he didn't do something they could die so he had rallied back and saved the day only to have his father ignore the fact that ONE, he was injured too, TWO, had just saved all of their lives, THREE, had fought to be more prepared before going into something so obviously hazardous and FOUR, all of the work that had actually been done right, had been done by Sam and only SAM… and not only had John ignored all of those things, he had gone at Sam's throat with venomous accusation of how it was all Sam's fault that things had gone wrong and that the twenty year old Dean was hurt all because of him and no one else… John Winchester had brushed off the actually ACCUURATE research that Sam had done, THEN had held a sixteen year old boy responsible for all of the ways that two fully grown ADULTS, had screwed up, even when NO ONE had even taken half a second to so much as try to listen to Sam's concerns about how unprepared they were to go up against something as strong as they were going up against…

Past Dean had been knocked unconscious upon his head colliding into the tree, so he hadn't born witness to the back of his father's colliding into the side of Sam's face for 'nearly getting them all killed' and for 'being responsible for Dean being hurt', and he had missed how after being so brutally attacked Sam had curled into his shell then shut down, ignoring how severely he was injured, because no one else had seemed to care, so he didn't see a point in caring either- it wasn't like he mattered to anyone or like he got to matter to even himself, because expecting to be allowed to get to matter to at least himself, was SELFISH- it broke Present day Dean's heart to see Sam be kicked down once again… And then his heart shattered even more when he watched how after their 'father' had gotten them 'home' he had put Past Dean on bed rest for a few days to heal from his bruised ribs, concussed head and twisted ankle, yet had ordered the even more severely injured sixteen year old Sam out to the yard for 'training'.

Past Dean had been just a few yards away, laid up in a soft comfy bed in the air conditioned cabin, while his 'father' had once again used 'training' as a way to hurt Sam… This time around it had been a 'sparring' session in which John had held nothing back, save for a killing blow here or there and when John had been done Sam had been literally and metaphorically beaten down as John hadn't been able to keep his stupid mouth shut as he had knocked Sam on his ass and threw punches and kicks all while 'reminding' Sam how 'weak' he was how 'useless' and how his 'failures' were going to be the reason Dean died,,, And for a bit Sam had been cowed by his bullying brute of a father, but then John had once again brought up how Sam would be the reason Dean died and Sam had just LOST IT…

The sixteen year old Sam went for the knife that his 'father' had shed himself of before the 'sparring' match and everything suddenly became so still and so quiet, not even the birds were singing any longer, it was as if the entire world was holding in a baited breath as it waited to witness John Winchester's fury at having a weapon pulled on him…

John had gone all cocky and had actually walked right up to Sam, to where they were only inches apart and basically taunted, BEGGED, for Sam to go ahead and try to take a 'stab at him'… But Sam had only reached out with lightening fast speed and snatched his "father's" wrist and placed the knife into his father's hand and brought that now knife wielding hand up to where the blade was biting into his Carotid Artery just enough to draw a little blood, then he snarled at his father that if he truly believed that he would be the reason Dean died, to please just kill him before he had the chance to get everything so wrong that it would cost Dean's life and then had been so cold and callous as he looked straight into his "father's" eyes and said "It's not like you wouldn't be doing all of us a favor by ending my life anyway."

And… John… John had, had the good sense to look horror stricken, as he shakily pried his wrist from Sam's iron grip and dropped the blade before looking at Sam with tear filled eyes as he pleadingly whispered "Sammy…"

But it fell on deaf ears. The sixteen year old just gave a silent yet defiant sneer before he picked up the knife, turned away and replied in a bitterly icy tone "My name is Sam.", then started walking away off towards the woods, because he wanted to just vanish into the trees so he could be alone with his thoughts and no one could see him crying over the fact that his 'father' had refused to kill him and now he was going to have to stop being such an 'irresponsible' coward and do it himself so his family would never again be endangered by his 'incompetence'….

Present day Dean was infuriated as he watched helplessly as the injured sixteen year old made it about a mile into the woods before finally breaking down and letting himself feel the pain of his injuries and his battered emotions. The sixteen year old boy had figured that he was far enough away from the cabin that his ghost wouldn't pose a threat to his family if it stuck around for some reason as he doubted that anyone would care enough to come retrieve his body so he could be properly salted and burned unless his spirit started posing some kind of nuisance that would bring other hunters to do the job that his 'family' surely wouldn't do for him once he was gone.

He let all of his heartbreak and longing for love and safety pout out as he pressed the blade into the sensitive flesh of the underside of his forearm. Two lines straight down his forearm on each arm that severed both the Radial and Ulnar Arteries would do the trick. He wanted to slit his own throat but he was actually more afraid of accidently doing that wrong (As he couldn't see the underside of his own neck and his own hands were too shaky and might miss the pulse point at the Carotid Artery) and possibly nicking his windpipe instead and suffer an agonizingly painful death of suffocation before he had a chance to bleed out… No… He didn't want to die like that… And according to all the research he's done, dying from just blood loss would take a few minutes, but there wouldn't be too much pain, it would be like just going to sleep in a cold, cold room area with no blankets to cover up and keep warm with, and he was already used to that just as much as he was already used to the biting pain of a cut to his flesh… He could do this… He had finally reached a place where he could do this… Today was the day he was finally going to cut right here… He pressed the tip of the knife… Two cuts down each forearm…

"One, for being so worthless that no matter what I do, how hard I try, no one is ever going to really love me." The boy stated through clenched teeth as he repeated his words from so long ago to count them out loud.

"And... Two." The boy ground out as he drew the edge of the down the skin of his forearm a second time "For being stupid enough to even care about still trying."…

He had only just started, and already, there was so much blood…

"Christ, Sam!... What the hell did you just do?!" John Winchester's terrified voice asked with quavering exclamation as he rushed to the sixteen year old's side and began to shed his over shirt so he could wrap it around Sam's bleeding forearm, but Sam stepped back shaking his head 'No.' as he said "Don't worry, I made sure to do at least this one thing right… It was too important to get wrong…"

John took a stagerring step foreward, but Sam backed away again "You need to stay back till after it's over, or else you might get blood all over you…It'll ruin your clothes and I know that's one of your favorite shirts… You don't have to be here to make sure I did it right cause it's gonna take at least thirty minutes after I do the other one, that's enough time for you to go back to the cabin and eat something, then you can come back and do the salt and burn, so,…"

"You really think that I'd just?..." John's face was pale as grief, fear, understanding and guilt, so much guilt, contorted his features… John took another shaky, warily, careful step forward, the sixteen year old Sam was still holding the knife and John had clearly been trying to keep Sam from just stabbing himself in the chest out of sheer desperation to die so he could keep his family safe, and then of course, he had to be careful for in case Sam struggled, for it would have truly been tragic should he move at the wrong moment and spook the boy causing him to trip and fall wrong, possibly right onto the blade..

John choked back a sob as he reached out and sternly said "Sam, give me the knife, son."

Sam shook his head and took another step back "Just two more cuts. Just two more." he whispered brokenly "And it will all be over, Dean will be safe."…

"Sam, no…" John jerked forward in two quick strides as Sam made the first cut down the other forearm, but froze, when Sam moved back again, Sam felt a tree root behind the heel of his right foot and easily stepped over it and once he was clear from the tripping hazard, John rushed forward again and grabbed for the knife…

There wasn't much of a struggle, Sam had already been significantly weakened by his injuries from not only the hunt, but his 'sparring' session with his father as well.

In the end the knife was ripped from Sam's hands and he let loose the choked and broken sobs of a person who had truly just lost everything…"Just one more cut… Just one more…" he pleaded as he reached out for the knife..

"You honestly thought that I was just going to walk away and let you kill yourself, didn't you?" John asked with a horrified expression of grim realization written across his face.

"Why wouldn't you?" Sam asked honestly, the blood loss added to his injuries were putting him in a state of mind where it felt like he was drugged and everything was all just some messed up dream, he could be candid about the things he asked or the answers he gave or even anything else he might want to say here, there was no reason to be so guarded, no reason that he had to keep his walls up in this place… "Me being dead will help keep you and Dean safe.."

It shouldn't have been possible, but John did in fact grow even more pale as Sam continued with "You and Dean are good at saving people… I…. I can't save anyone, I'm just the reason they'll end up dead…"

Sam listed sideways and his shoulder came to rest against a tree, then Sam began to crumple to the ground… But for once in John's life he was actually there to catch Sam before he hit the ground….

Sam pulled his arms away with a brokenly sobbed whisper of "You'll get blood on you.."

"Sam.. I don't care about that.."

Sam held his arms up for John to see the cuts as clear as day "I did it right, daddy, I promise.."

"Jesus…" John cried as he somehow found a way to cradle Sam's, lanky, knobby kneed and sharp elbowed form into his chest just like he was a tiny bundle once more.

"I did it right.." Sam whispered again…

"I know son… I know you did it right." John replied with a bitten off sob as he tore his shirt in half and began to wrap Sam's arms.

"Daddy, no… It can't work if the cuts can't bleed.."

"I know…" And now John was openly crying, no highly built, guarded walls of steel to keep his emotions at bay. Like he was finally understanding that HE was the one who was 'irresponsible' and couldn't put his 'priorities' in the proper order, that HE was the 'incompetent' one, who was going to get his family killed, who had almost gotten them killed several times, already..… John gathered Sam to his chest and carried him to his big black beast of a truck where he hastily tore open the First Aid Kit and began to stitch up Sam's arms and Sam just stared down blearily, feeling like a failure, because he doesn't know how, but somehow he hadn't done it right after all and because he hadn't done it right his father was stitching him back up, forcing him to live until he could figure out 'the right way' to do it, because his father was all about doing things over and over again until they were gotten perfectly right and he guessed that even included things like this… But… Why?... Why, when he could have just been rid of the disappointing, disgraceful failure of a son?

He must have said that out loud, because his father cries "No, no, Sammy, I'm the failure, I'm the failure, son, not you… Never you."

The sixteen year old feels so confused as he lets himself be taken into the comforting darkness of unconsciousness.

Present day Dean wipes his eyes with a trembling hand as Angie gives his other hand a gentle squeeze and when he looks over at her, she's crying too… There's so much emotion from what he's just witnessed that he feels like he's been tossed out into a storm raging ocean with nothing to hold onto and nothing to help keep him afloat… And there's no one to save him and no land in sight…

And he knows that what he's feeling right now, can't compare to what the sixteen year old Sam had been feeling back then, because he had FELT what Sam had felt, and knew that it had been muted for him because if he had felt those things as completely as Sam had, his heart would have shredded itself inside his chest and been rendered useless… He has no idea how the still young Sam had survived the impact of such dark and heavy feelings of despair and loneliness hitting him full force. Because after even just a glimpse at those feelings, it feels like he's dying, like the emotions themselves are literally killing him…Eating away at him from the center of his being and spreading out like a lethal disease.

Staggering under the weight of it all, Present day Dean watches and lets his heart break even more as Sam wakes up and is .. Disappointed to not be dead…

He watches as the sixteen year old scans his bandaged arms then bared torso and boxer clad legs, and realizes that at some point while he had been unconscious, his father had stripped him down to his boxers and patched up all of his injures. The sixteen year old looks over and sees his father sitting beside his bed, staring at him with red rimmed eyes and a half empty bottle of Jack Daniels in his hand…

"What were you thinking?" John's icy cold voice hissed the venomous whisper "Do you even care about what your killing yourself would have done to Dean?"

"You could have just lied to him, told him I ran away again.." The sixteen year old croaked as his vocal cords felt stretched and abused from all of his earlier sobbing.

"Damn it, Sam!" John gritted out as he slammed his empty hand on the nightstand next to Sam's head, causing the boy to flinch violently away from both the oncoming hand and the sudden loud noise.

Something about the way Sam flinched must have brought John back to himself a little because the man looked down at the bottle of liquor he was clutching in his hand, then up at Sam "Dear, god… What?... What am I doing?" he asked of no one in particular, as if he were expecting the universe to answer his query, or as if he were expecting his long departed wife to guide him. John looked up again, clearly confused and horrified by his own behavior and just dropped the bottle of liquor and stumbled back until he was out of the room, leaving the sixteen year old Sam alone.

Thankfully the boy was too weak to really move around too much or else the sixteen year old would have tried again because he truly wished to give his family freedom from all the ways he constantly ruined their lives, from all the ways he hurt them and put them in danger because he was so 'selfish', 'irresponsible' and 'incompetent'…

Present day Dean clenched his teeth, anger, disgust, HATE, all raging inside him, making him want to tear John Winchester apart, limb from limb… John hadn't wanted to actually have to bear the burden of the guilt of all the ways his irresponsible neglect and ignorant incompetence hurt BOTH his sons, so he had pushed it all onto Sam, made Sam bear all of it till he had finally, truly believed that it was his to carry… That he was the one who was responsible for his family's safety and happiness and any time his family was not safe or happy, it was all, somehow, his fault…

'Gee.'… Present day Dean wondered as he thought back on his own past and all the ways he had made Sam shoulder the responsibility of guilt that wasn't his to bear "Wonder who that reminds me of."

And… Yep… Present day Dean received confirmation, that he had in fact done that as he watched how a few days later, Past Dean had gotten in Sam's face with "Well, maybe if you wouldn't argue with him or push his buttons every chance you got, dad would take it easier on you." when Sam had dared to 'complain' about the increase to his list of chores and his 'training' regiment, because school had just started and he already had tons of homework, plus he was still tender around the midsection and his head was still killing him. Past Dean hadn't cared enough to even think that a fully grown adult should be the one held responsible for the arguing, after all, John had been the adult and it had been his responsibility to actually LISTEN to his CHILD about his concerns for THEIR FAMILY'S safety and should have been responsible enough to do his own damn THOROUGH research if he couldn't learn to accept the research Sam did as being accurate…. Hell, if Present day Dean was to be really, REALLY honest about all of it…

The only truly responsible thing John Winchester could have done was either put his SONS' happiness and WELLBEING above and before ANYTHING else and should have never drug his CHILDREN into a life where they'd be constantly brushed to the back of the pile, forgotten and neglected OR John should have given custody of them over to someone who wouldn't have treated having the chance to raise them as a burden that no one wanted. Someone who would have been a responsible ADULT presence who would have BEEN THERE for when those two KIDS needed them, instead of halfway across the country while they fended for themselves at just ten and fourteen years of age for weeks at a time. Someone who wouldn't have drug two children out into cemeteries in the middle of the night to fight against the pissed of spirits of deceased murderers… No… Someone who would have been responsible enough to know that SIXTEEN was too young to hunt AT ALL…

Because that was the brutal and honest TRUTH of the matter… Neither he nor Sam should have ever started hunting AT ALL until they had been old enough to actually CHOOSE that without it being FORCED on them like it was somehow their responsibility to 'hunt things' like THAT was the only way to 'save people'…

Sam had been right when he said that people die all the time, they get hit by buses, eaten by sharks, buried in an avalanche, RAPED and MURDERED by other PEOPLE and sometimes they even get hurt or killed by a real honest to goodness, spirit, monster or demon… And it wasn't their job, wasn't their responsibility to save any of those people… In fact there was no real way to save anyone… Because EVERYONE dies at some point and no one can choose how long they live, when they go, who they love and loose along the way or who loves and loses them when Death comes for them, because as much as he wants to say otherwise DEATH was the one thing no one could really fight against if it was really their time, yes there were ways to 'help' someone live through a near death experience, someone could push that person out of the path of the bus, someone could scare way the sharks and get the injured swimmer to safety, someone could dig up the person trapped under the snow, someone could stop the rapist before they killed yet another person, and someone ELSE besides THEM, someone who actually WANTED the 'job', could salt and burn corpses, shoot flare guns at Wendigos and exorcise demons, from now on, because he was tired of sacrificing both Sam's and his lives and happiness to a 'job'… There were other jobs in the world that they could do and still be helping people, if helping people was what they wanted, they didn't have to be hunters…

He just wishes he had realized THAT about sixteen years ago when he had turned eighteen and could have legally taken custody of Sam and moved them to Bobby's where John couldn't force the consequences of his own mistakes onto Sam's shoulders anymore…

It was painful to watch how over the next couple of months the sixteen year old Sam had withdrew more and more and how steadily John had seemed to stop caring altogether once again, how that simple 'not caring' had once again taken it's toll on the still young Sam's psyche, John and Sam had started arguing more and more resulting in more and more difficult 'training sessions' for Sam, where now most of the time John settled for 'sparring' which allowed him to hit Sam and then blame Sam for getting hit because he hadn't been able to properly defend himself and Past Dean would always end up chastising Sam for 'pushing dad's buttons' every time an argument got close to getting out of hand right in front of him, basically blaming Sam for making their father angry enough to put more 'training' on him and resulting in more 'sparring sessions', because their father had been trying to teach Sam 'discipline' as well as how to defend himself, except now Present day Dean was now seeing how it had been basically John using 'sparring' as a great cover to beat the ever loving crap out of Sam, for daring to defy him, without either of his sons seeing it for the abuse that it really was.. How he had basically been blaming Sam for 'making' their father abuse him, by always being 'inconveniently argumentative' about all of their safety.. How Past Dean had professed that John Winchester was completely blameless, in fact he had really been the victim, because of all the ways Sam had 'forced' his hand and his anger, and his hurtful words and actions… Yeah, that just made him the Best Big Brother In The Whole Wide World… Didn't it?

No… No, it really didn't… Crap.. These memories just kept kicking him right where it hurt, even, while he was down. He couldn't help all the times he had basically told Sam that he was a bad brother and a bad son all because he couldn't be a 'good little soldier', and it kept coming back to that.. All the ways he had basically put all the blame for all the ways Sam had been abused, right onto Sam's shoulders because of how SAM had been the one who wouldn't comply..

It was hard to admit, but he had basically turned into one of those horrible people who sit by and watch as their own kid gets abused right in front of them then tells the kid "You brought this on yourself." and he's not very pleased with the realization that, that was the kind of person he used to be, the kind of person he was when Sam had needed him most.

Present day Dean watched as Sam continued to struggle over the next two and a half years of his life and how no matter how hard Sam had tried, he had always received the same results… He would never be a good enough soldier, a good enough brother, a good enough son. So, the boy had fought tooth and nail just to be able to get to go to school each day over what would be those next two and a half years, so he could graduate because John Winchester and the Dean Winchester of the past, had made something as simple as Sam wanting, needing the safety of school (because if he was going to school John was less inclined to hit him in places where people would see the bruises whenever they 'sparred', while he was still a minor), into a bad thing, despite how clear it had been that Sam had needed those brief escapes during the weekdays just to survive the nights, weekends and school breaks with people who ran him into the ground, belittled him, ripped away his self-worth, HURT him and made him feel hated, yet called themselves his 'family'…

When he watched Sam apply to Stanford while he was still in High School, then succeed at getting his high school diploma, he felt his heart swell with pride because Sam had overcome a great deal of adversity just to get to stay in school, and it made his heart ache to know that there were so many times when Sam had come so very close to not even surviving long enough to see that day.

And despite how Past Sam's life had been bad enough before he had gotten that diploma, his life had gotten even WORSE after, he had gotten it…

Because John hadn't needed to worry about CPS swooping in and snatching Sam away anymore...

Hits came more frequently and since Sam was now well over eighteen and out of school it couldn't be considered 'child abuse'…

But the final straw had come the night Sam finally left for Stanford…

Past Dean had been out doing a supply run when Sam had gotten the letter of acceptance.

And Sam, he may have had his moments where he was cowed by his father's wrath, but the boy had refused for this to be one of them, he had been so brave when he went straight to John, showed him the letter and said "I've decided to go.", because Sam hadn't forgotten how his going to college and having a good paying job could possibly help Dean get out of hunting for good. And he had figured that since he couldn't die right and save Dean that way, then this would be the next best thing he could do to save Dean.

But... There was an argument John bellowing forcefully at Sam about how the thing that killed his mother was still out there and Sam had said "I know, dad… But I don't think mom would want this life for… "

"Well, you don't get to care about what you THINK she would want…" John had growled.

"Why?!" Sam shouted..

"Because YOU'RE the reason she's dead!" John had snapped angrily as he backhanded Sam for what would be the last time.

And Sam had broken right then and there, the final straw had been one too many on the camel's back.

The now nineteen year old Sam took a shuddering breath, there was so many things he wanted to say in reply to the weight of the blame his father had just put on his shoulders, but the only thing he could say was "I'm going."

Past Dean had picked that moment to walk in with "Going where, Sammy?"

Then there had been more arguing and senseless shouting matches filled with hurtful words, and in the end Sam had ended up with his packed bag dangling haphazardly from one hand while his other hand rested tentatively on the doorknob, because he was already rethinking his decision to go, to leave his big brother… And then John Winchester, fool that he was, had looked a gift horse right in the mouth and ruined any shot that either of them would have had at convincing Sam to stay as he bit out the cruelly cold words "If you walk out that door, don't ever come back." and Past Dean had just stood there silent as a stone, making Sam believe that he had agreed with their father and Sam's puppy dog eyes that had clearly been pleading for Past Dean to go with him, had done nothing to break Past Dean's stony façade, had done nothing to get that Dean to show Past Sam that he would still be loved no matter what he chose, and so Sam had put on an equally stony mask as he walked out the door without looking back, it wasn't till Sam had made it to about a block away that he finally let the proof of his heartbreak cascade down his face...

Clearly the night that his father had told him that he was the reason his mother had died and that if he left he could 'never go home', had NOT been a good memory for Sam even without that last backhand to the face or the lack of the showing of brotherly love and support. Present day Dean wonders how he could have been so blind as to not realize that the night Sam left for Stanford could not have been a good memory in any context, especially if Sam had still been holding on to their father's hurtful words even a whole two years later… He hates himself for letting memories that he should have known in his heart weren't Sam's "Greatest Hits" had led him to making the horrendous and devastating mistake of throwing away Sam's love and everything that represented it when he dropped that Amulet into a trashcan a little over three years ago.. And he should have known that those memories weren't really Sam's "Greatest Hits" just because of how that one memory of the night Sam left for Stanford should have given away Zachariah's ruse… But he had been blinded by anger at the fact that NONE of what he had perceived to have been Sam's "Greatest Hits" back then had included him.

And what's sad, is he can't even think of why any of Sam's "Greatest Hits" should have included him now that he's seen what he's seen, now that he knows what he knows… Because he'd rather Sam have a Heaven without him in it instead of the HELL that he himself had helped make Sam's life into…


	12. Chapter 6. Part 7.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

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> 3 more parts to "Chapter 6" left to go after this

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As he watched the nineteen year old Sam board the next bus that would eventually take to another bus station to wait for another bus that would eventually take him to a life away from abuse, he felt a new wave of anger rise up in him… The bus ride would be a grueling three days long because of changeovers and departure times of whatever new bus Sam would be boarding, when if he had been driven there.. Or if he had, had HIS OWN DAMN CAR to drive himself there, it would have taken a measly twenty-six to thirty hours depending on how many stops were made and for how long was taken at each stop… But NO!..

Past Dean had only seen how he was being abandoned NOT how his little brother could really use a ride… No.. He had never thought about how his little brother could really use a car of his own back then, especially when considering how he was pretty sure getting from one end to the other of a GIANT campus hadn't been exactly easy on his kid brother… No one had allowed Sam to have even that small amount of independence, John Winchester had his own truck and Dean had been given the Impala… But what had Sam had back then?... Who had even thought about how Sam should get to have his own vehicle too?

When Present day Dean really thinks about it… Sam's never really had a vehicle that he could call his own except that one time when he had been soulless… Which how can THAT count, because it hadn't really been 'SAM'S', Sam's, now had it?.. And even if it could count, it had lasted all of five seconds of him having his big brother back in his life before the poor car was totaled… And Dean has worked with worse… He could have fixed it till it was as good as new again… But he hadn't even cared to try or to even ask to try because he was too busy feeling happy over something of Sam's being destroyed because it meant that Sam would have no choice but to ride with him…

Oh… Wait there was when he had known he was going to die and he told Sam that the Impala was going to be his… Present day Dean wants to scoff at himself because all of six seconds after finding Sam he was reclaiming ownership of the Impala back, but not before ripping out Sam's Ipod jack with the accusation of 'douching' up HIS car, but he hadn't really cared to think about the damage that he himself might have caused to the lighter port where the jack had been plugged into, because when he had ripped out the Ipod jack, the car had technically still been Sam's because Sam hadn't actually given the Impala back to him, he had only offered to let him drive, but the second the last traces of Sam actually owning the Impala had literally been ripped out, the Impala had become HIS again, and of course he hadn't thought to give two fucks about how he might have damaged Sam's Ipod jack… He had basically been all like "Thanks for staying alive to take care of my car, but this whole proof that you had the nerve to actually have your own existence in MY SPACE, while I was dead, thing has to go, 'bye-bye', now." and when he had come back from Purgatory Sam had just handed over the keys without question and the first thing Dean had done was start in on how the inside of the Impala had smelled like dog as if he had been entitled to attack any kind of sign that Sam had, had any sort of happiness when he hadn't been around to have control over it.

God.. He really was an asshole, wasn't he?

But as he looked back on a few things he realized that it was more than just Sam not ever really having a vehicle of his own that he was pissed off about… Because as he really thought about it… He couldn't think of one single thing that was actually Sam's that HE hadn't in some way shape or form taken over at some point as if it were his too like he was entitled to it.. From Sam's clothes to Sam's laptop.. Sam didn't really have anything… Not one thing that was actually HIS that he got to keep because someone always came in and either took it away, told him he couldn't have it, broke it, infected it with viruses or wore it like it was theirs and not his… It was disrespectful.. Oh god… He's never once really shown his brother's personal possessions or personal space any real respect, yet he expects Sam to just jump up and show him unconditional respect no matter what sort of asshole he's making himself out to be. He has always had a thing for taking what little control Sam had in life over anything, away and making it his own as if Sam wasn't 'allowed' to have a say or control over his own life or belongings unless DEAN allowed him a small measure of that control so he could feel like 'a big boy' every once in a while, but other than that Sam had no real rights to his own life or belongings.

Oh dear god.. He really had become his father and Sam had indeed suffered because of it….

Present day Dean watched as a very exhausted nineteen year old Sam made it to his destination with only minutes to spare before he had to be at Orientation. The poor kid basically fell asleep on his feet as he waited in line for a key to his dorm but thankfully, since his last name started with a 'W', he was practically at the end of the line anyway so no one noticed and if they did, they probably understood how he felt cause they were just as far towards the end of the line as him.

The nineteen year old finally got his key, text books and 'Welcoming' packets from the oh so helpful RA's and book clerks at the table so he was finally able to trudge tiredly to his dorm and crash into the unclaimed bed without even caring that it wasn't made… Because it wasn't like he had sheets and blankets he could put on it anyway… All he had was just a medium sized duffle bag full of clothes a couple of notebooks, one package of pencils and a picture of his mom and dad that he had, had no choice but to sneak out of his father's belongings or else he wouldn't even have anything to remember his family by… He would have grabbed a picture of Dean too… Except… There weren't any pictures of Dean that weren't in his father's journal, so if he had braved trying to snag one, it wouldn't have taken long for his father to notice it missing, which would have lead his father to tearing through his duffle bag and discovering the picture of his mom that he had basically stolen… He shudders to think of what would have happened and he knows for certain that the beating he would have gotten would have gotten someone put in the hospital and possibly more than one person dead . But he feels like a traitor because it feels like he had chosen a memory of a mother he never got to know over a memory of the one parent who was actually THERE for him as he had grown up… He wishes he had been brave enough to risk taking a picture of Dean, anyway, despite what the consequences might have been… It would have beat feeling like a traitor any day of the week.

But, he had no way to go back, no way to try to steal one of those memories to keep just for himself… So he has to hold the memories that he does have close and always keep them burning bright in his mind so he never forgets that Dean was THERE… Because a memory is all he's going to get… He's never going to see Dean ever again…

Now he really wishes he had risked stealing a picture.

It's with thoughts like these that he surrenders to a giant black wall of unconsciousness with tears, still streaming down his face.

When he wakes up he feels numb and floaty but he's so used to feeling like this that it hardly even registers beyond a small sigh of relief, because right in this second he can't feel the pain and he knows to be thankful for what little reprieves from the pain that life so mercifully allows him to have.

He knows that when the pain ebbs back in that it will consume him until everything is clouded behind a misty grey, foggy wall of oppressively heavy sadness.

It's best not to think of those things in times like this… it's like inviting trouble right in and offering it dinner and a place to stay the night.

He wants to go without the pain for as long as possible.

But it doesn't take long before something reminds him of Dean, of the only little piece of 'home' that he always carried in his heart. His one and only tie to a mother he never really got to know and a BEFORE that he never really got a chance to live in.

He wonders what life might have been like in that BEFORE, the great big BEFORE, the one where monsters were things that were only in movies that Dean would have been too young to see at only four. Was his father a good man back then?, Was he a good dad?.. He doesn't remember how old he was when he had first noticed the hate lingering in his father's eyes that seemed to be reserved only for him but he o with knows that once he had, that, that had been one of the things he had always noticed from that moment on.. But sometimes he thinks he remembers a time when his father looked at him without hate clouding his gaze, but the memory is fuzzy and seems more like a dream than reality and it hurts to think that that memory might be nothing but a vaguely happy illusion because now he has to question every single memory of the man that he has. Like all the times his father had sounded fondly amused as he scolded him and Dean for rough housing in the living room. Had the man been fondly amused by BOTH Dean AND him, or just Dean? Had the man even ever really notice that he had, had TWO SONS? Or had John ever only saw Dean and 'that other kid who was the reason their life was hell and who would never be Dean'?

Just who had he been to his father? Just who had he been to Dean? Now that he was gone from them for good, did they ever even think of him at all?, Did they miss him at all? Even just a little? Or were they happy to finally be rid of the hideous black spot in their lives?

After he completed school and got a job as a lawyer.. If he found Dean and asked him to come share that dream they both had, had as kids, would Dean just see the burden that he never wanted to bear as he laughed in his face before telling him to get lost?

He chastised himself for thinking such things, it would be well within his family's rights to be glad to be rid of him, he is the reason their lives were ruined after all.

All he could do was keep striving to accomplish the goals of graduating and getting a good paying job as a lawyer and hope that the four years between now and then would give Dean's and his father's hearts enough time to grow even just a little fond of him and that it would be enough time to heal old wounds, like all the clichés say. Because, then maybe. MAYBE he could save BOTH of the remaining members of his small family by helping to provide them with the support they'd need to leave hunting and start over.

Hell, if they'd let him, he's sure that, barring them committing a Felony that could be proven in a court of law within the next four years, he could get most if not all of the infractions on their criminal records expunged just by using the few things that he already knew about Law and he's certain that by the time he's ready to take the B.A.R. Exam and get his License he'll be well versed in every Loophole that he could exploit to clear his brother's and father's names of most of their 'misdeeds' that they had done and most likely would still do over the next four years, out of necessity to do 'the work' they did and to keep themselves afloat. Which would mean that, in four years, he hopefully, really would be able to help them obtain legally legitimate means to live and support themselves, if they'd give him the chance to help them, come four years from now, that is.

Part of him knows that it's probably all just a pipedream, but part of him believes in that dream anyway, part of him HOPES that he can eventually, truly, help give his family a life outside of hunting, so, he will not give up on that dream.

~0~

Over the next few weeks the nineteen year old Sam manages to impress all of his Professors and most of his peers and by the time his Second Nine Week Classes start he's making enough money as a Tutor to keep himself afloat for when the Holiday Breaks hit and his Grants and Scholarship won't cover his meals, and he splits that money in half, half to keep himself fed over the Holiday Breaks and the other half to save and add to for when the longer Summer Break hits and he'll not only have to pay for his meals but his housing as well as his Grants and Scholarship wouldn't be kicking back in till that coming Fall Semester.

When Thanksgiving Break hits, his roommate, Brady offers him a place to go to celebrate Thanksgiving, but as it is, Sam feels too caught up in the depression of missing his own family and he doesn't want to spoil Brady's Holiday so he politely declines and when the week long break ends, Brady comes back different. Brady is no longer studious and keen to stay on his education and career tracks and is instead, seemingly only interested in partying and getting drunk and sometimes even high. It only takes two ditched classes before Sam starts pouring himself into trying to figure out a way to help his friend, but Brady doesn't seem interested in the offered help, Sam has heard the horror stories of kids coming into College raring to tackle the world only to fizzle out and buckle under the pressure before falling prey to the temptations of becoming a slacker who's only interested in partying and hooking up. He thinks this is what's happened to his friend and he tries his best to be as supportive as possible without getting drug in too deep, but when Brady comes back DANGEROUSLY drunk for a fifth night in a row, Sam figures that it might be smart to start going with Brady to at least be there to cut his friend off before he gets so drunk that he's actually risking dying in his sleep from aspirating on his own vomit.

Getting more involved than he had intended ends up taking a bit of a toll, his grades take a small backslide, but it's enough to worry his Professors, when one of them ask him what's going on with him he explains about his roommate Brady and how he's just been caught up with trying to help keep his friend from flushing his life down the drain. He gets some sage advice to focus more on keeping himself from flushing his own life down the drain and he takes it to heart and knows that he has to pull back from his involvement in Brady's problems, because he had done all he could and now he has no choice but to let Brady find his own way.

He goes to one more party with Brady out of duty to their dwindling and increasingly strained friendship and it's there that things, seemingly, take a turn for the better.

Brady gets pretty drunk and he gets to where he's stumbling around and embarrassing not only himself, but Sam as well, but Sam finds that he's not Brady's only friend here and he's not the only one who's embarrassed for Brady's sake. There's a few other people who have known Brady over the course of the Semester who have also seen the change in him and eight of them, Sam included, get together to get Brady's drunk self back to the dorm and on the way back to the dorm, Brady drunkenly makes introductions and Sam meets seven of Brady's other friends, Josh Ludwig, Nathan Roberts, Kelly Watson, Marissa Fulton, Rebecca Warren, Shawn Chambers and Jessica Moore and when the six of them get Brady back to the dorm, they ply Brady with coffee till he's sober enough to hear them out during the impromptu intervention and by the end of the night Brady is crying because he's "just been going through some stuff" but he won't elaborate what that 'stuff' is, which leaves Brady's friends to merely theorize what all might be going on with Brady.

But still as it is, Sam feels horrible for thinking about giving up on his friend, especially if he's "going through some stuff" and apparently he's not the only one, Jessica, Nathan and Josh are the only others out of Brady's friends who don't just get up and walk out with the declaration of being 'so done' with Brady's crap… But apparently just the four of them sticking around is enough, because a few days and a few interventions later, Brady starts getting his act back together, well, mostly… He doesn't quite quit partying or getting sloppy drunk, but he keeps it to the weekends like a normal college kid who's enjoying their newfound freedoms, that and Brady also manages to get his grades out of the proverbial toilet, which puts Sam at enough ease that he allows himself to start cutting the apron strings again so Brady can begin to relearn how to keep control of his own life without him there to act as his training wheels. But now that he, Nathan, Rebecca, Josh and Jessica have spent so much time together trying to keep Brady from Self-Destructing, all four of them have become really close friends and Sam starts realizing that, yeah he likes his other 'new' friends, but he likes, LIKES, Jessica and maybe wants to be more than her friend and he really wants to ask if she might feel the same way too… So once it's clear that Brady doesn't need all of them constantly there to help keep him from falling back into his worst habits, Sam finally asks Jessica if maybe she'd like to go on a date with him and when Jessica grins and says "Only if it's a 'DATE' date.", Sam feels like he's on cloud nine when he says "Yeah.. I'd really like to go with you on a 'DATE', date…", to which Jessica had replied "Pick me up at seven."

It was only till about an hour later that Sam wanted to smack his head on a concrete pillar as he remembered that he doesn't have a car to take Jessica anywhere.

Thank everything that's holy that he has kung-fu level internet searching skills, because another hour later and he has a list of all the places that are within walking distance of the campus.

Walking.. Walking was good, walking was romantic.. Right?..

"I'm so screwed." Sam groaned as he let his head thump on the table beside the keyboard.

That night when he gets to Jessica's dorm and knocks on the door he's sweating bullets.

He feels like a walking cliché as he stand in the hall fidgeting nervously, trying to work up the courage to knock on the door.

And he had thought asking her out would be the end of the scary stuff.

But now he's suddenly terrified that everything will go wrong and that by the end of the night he'll look like a complete jackass who Jessica will never want to speak to or maybe not even want to look at, ever again.

When Jessica answers the door, she's beautiful.. She's wearing jeans and a tee shirt, stuff he sees her in all the time.. But she's done something different with her hair. It's hanging in loose ringlets around her shoulders, adorning her with a golden halo as the light bounces off her hair… Sam's so awestruck by her beauty and that she had actually said yes to going out to dinner with him as more than friends that it causes his heart to start racing so frantically that for the first few seconds all he can hear is the sound of his blood rushing through his eardrums, but his eyes are tracking her mouth and he knows she just said something.

Oh, god… What did she just say?

What did she just say?

He's so busy freaking out that he missed what she said, that he doesn't hear what she says next and all he can do is stand there dumbly, with his mouth hanging open and feeling like he'll burst into tears at any second, because it's just like he had feared, he's making an ass of himself.

"I.. Uh.." He stammers nervously as he tries to just go with it, he feels like his whole face is flushed and he's sure he's redder than a stop sign from blushing so furiously.. "I was hoping.. Uh.. There's this place just off campus called Jade Palace and I was hoping you wouldn't mind.. Walking there withmecauseIkindadon'thaveacar." Sam said the last part in one rushed whoosh of run together words.

Jessica just looked at him with a bit of playful mischief twinkling in her eyes as she said "Sam.. I've known you for more than two weeks.. I kinda already figured out that you didn't have a car a while back."

"Oh…. I.. I.."

"Sam?.." Jessica asked sweetly "Are you, nervous about going on an actual 'DATE', date with me?"

"This is my first actual date." Sam confessed nervously.

Jessica's eyebrows shot up in surprise "Really?"

Sam nodded.

"Can I tell you a secret?" She asked shyly.

Sam nodded again.

"This is my first actual date, too."

"Really?" Sam asked with a nervous gulp.

Jessica's grin grew even wider as she blushed and gave him a nod in reply before saying "And you know what else?"

"What else?" Sam asked with a weak croak as if his voice was trying to strand him and leave him to flail then drown.

"I was nervous about our date too.."

A breath of relief wooshed out of him so fast at hearing that, that it left him light headed "Really?"

"Yeah.. But then I remembered that you're still the same guy I've known and been friends with these last few weeks, that you're still the same guy that I really wanted to be more than friends with. And suddenly I wasn't nervous anymore, because I know that I already know you well enough to know that I can't screw things up between us, because I've never been anything but myself around you, and you already liked me just fine. That you actually liked me enough to ask me out even though you already knew what the real me's really like."

"I like real you.." He felt stupid for saying it, but it was the only thing he could think to say.

"And I like, real you, too.." Jessica replied sweetly as she put her hand in his and laced their fingers together and with that they walked together, hand in hand off on an adventure that was a first for both of them…

Come February 2003, Sam and Jessica are already pretty serious about each other and by the time Summer hits they've decided to get an apartment on campus together.

When the next Fall Semester began, heralding in Sam's Sophomore year at Stanford, Sam really began to come out of his shell even more.. Sam had, had friendships that he had gotten to keep going for more than a year and having friends that long gave him a newfound sense of security as he wasn't afraid of having to move away from those friends. Which, really made a difference to just about everything in Sam's life, and the fact the now, twenty year old Sam was actually able to be himself for the first time since he was eight (well, mostly, there was still lots of secrets he had no choice but to keep), meant he was no longer so withdrawn which made him less of a target for bullying.

Sam had only needed a chance to actually get to grow into his own person.

It hurt as Present day Dean realized that the way he and their father had made Sam live, had made the boy more of a target for someone looking to prey on a lonely, withdrawn child that clearly hadn't really had anyone to go to. People like all of the school bullies that Sam had, had to deal with, that he never told anyone about, people like the bastards who had singled Sam out because of how 'alone' he had obviously been, had made them assume the child wouldn't be missed by anyone who would really care to actually do much about his disappearance and then there was Sam's own father who had used the isolation and alienation he himself imposed on the kid as a means to get away with hitting him, with running his physical, mental, emotional and spiritual health into the ground because he had known the boy would never tell and he had been smart enough to keep anyone from catching him in the act, save for only one time, by someone he had immediately cut out of Sam's life so that Sam would continue to feel like he had no one to turn to. And if Dean were to be honest, he had been abusive towards Sam too… Because he had been an ADULT for four years before Sam had turned eighteen, which meant that every time he had taken a cheap shot at that child's self-esteem, every time he had brow beaten the kid over fighting with their father, over running away, over him just being SAM over the four years it had taken Sam to join him in adulthood , he had been abusing a CHILD, no 'basically' or 'technically', because it was cut and dry, that, THAT was the truth, he hadn't just been an asshole to Sam, he had been a child abusing asshole to Sam for four years of Sam's life. And then he had wanted to act all hurt because Sam had left him behind to go to College?, He's lucky that Sam had thought about keeping the two eldest Winchester men out of jail when instead the kid could have been well within his rights to use everything he had, had at his disposal to get his ABUSERS thrown under a jail the first second he had, had a chance.

Present day Dean watched as the twenty year old Sam hung out with Jessica, Rebecca, Nathan and Brady in the library, the five of them were having a 'riveting' conversation about The Iliad because apparently all of them had Humanities, they just didn't have the class at the same time or on the same days, but they did, all, apparently have the same assignment. Sam was fervent that there was solid Lore that backed his theory that Helen hadn't loved neither Menelaus nor Paris but both had felt entitled to her because of her beauty. Menelaus had felt entitled for he had 'won' the 'right' to be her suitor while Paris had felt entitled to just kidnap her and claim her as his because of the promise Aphrodite had made him. But neither of them deserved her, because both of them only wanted her for her beauty, neither of them had loved her and she hadn't loved either of them.

Brady made the debate that Helen had loved Paris and had chosen to dishonor her marriage vows to Menelaus.

And Sam had come back with a few historical facts that according to several accounts Helen had only been SIX YEARS OLD when she was forced to marry Menelaus and not even seven yet when she bore her first child.

"That's impossible, a girl that young can't have kids." Nathan had interrupted with his own debate.

"Actually the youngest mother on record was barely five when she gave birth, meaning that some sick bastard raped her when she was still just four years old and because she had a Precocious Puberty, that bastard managed to make her pregnant when she was still just a baby herself." Sam growled in reply "So it's actually very possible that Helen was around seven years old when she gave birth to her first child, and since Paris took her after she had been married to Menelaus for a little more than two years, that means she was only just eight years old when Paris kidnapped her and took her from her home and her two children that Menelaus had fathered."

"You're forgetting something though, Sammy.." Brady chimed.

"Don't call me Sammy." Sam stated in an annoyed huff as he rolled his eyes.

"All throughout the Iliad whenever Helen is talked about, she is talked about as a WOMAN, not a girl."

"That's because back then, the second a girl had her first menses she was considered a woman, no one would have cared how young she was, they only would have cared that she was old enough to marry off to some rich and skanky suitor who was looking to bed a child… Why do you think so many MEN continuously referred to her as 'the most beautiful woman in THE WORLD'?" Jessica asked sounding irritated by Brady's ignorance as she waved a sheet of notes in his face. And when Brady shrugged she added "Well don't you think they might have thought she was the most beautiful because she was so young, yet capable of bearing a child so they no longer had to keep their perverted lusts in check when it came to trying to be the one to win the right to have every sick bastard's wet dream lying in their bed?"

Sam was a bit taken aback by Jessica's impassioned response but he agreed whole heartedly. His notes on the subject were the ones, Jessica was waving around after all. But not everyone felt the same. Brady made the mistake of huffing out a laugh as he said "So you're saying that in class tomorrow, you'll debate to defend a WOMAN who brought about the ruin of more than one nation on the basis that everyone around her were basically baby rapists that wanted her because she was still just a little girl when she got her first period?"

"That's exactly what I'm saying!" Jessica hissed as she slapped her hand on the table angrily, making Sam instinctively flinch at the sound and motion, at first he had thought no one noticed, but then he looked over and saw Jessica's worried eyes gazing at him questioningly.

Sam gave a nervous cough and tried to cover up his reaction and the librarian's 'shushing' of Jessica's 'outburst' helped provide sufficient distraction that kept her from actually asking why he had flinched the way he had.

Brady leaned in and stated "Well there's no proof that Helen was only a child when she married Menelaus which means there's no proof that she was just a child when she ran away with Paris and abandoned her husband and her two children, so your debate will only be based on theory alone."

"Actually, according to certain accounts it took eight years for Agamemnon and Menelaus to even get to Greece and another nine years just to end the war. If Helen had truly been the 'most common', not the most 'abided by' age of marriage, which was like, sixteen back then, then by the end of the war she would have been over thirty years old and it's unlikely anyone would have still saw her as 'the MOST BEAUTIFUL WOMAN IN THE WORLD' at that point, yet, when the war ended and Menelaus went to kill her, Helen dropped her robes and he was so captivated by the need to possess her beauty that he dropped his sword, which I think means it's pretty likely that Helen was still very young even after seventeen years." Rebecca chimed in as she looked at a set of notes in front of her.

"That actually makes a lot of sense. She would have been like, what?.. Twenty-four, twenty-five at the end of the war instead of almost into her mid thirties if that was true." Josh added with a thoughtful look.

Rebecca nodded and Nathan leaned in and said "Well, there is the rumor that he stayed his sword because of her beauty.. BUT- and this could help support both Sam's theory that everything that Paris did with Helen was against Helen's consent- there are other less well known accounts that say Menelaus dropped his blade because when Helen dropped her robes, she was showing him bruises and scarring that proved she hadn't willingly been bedded by Paris and it was Menelaus' guilt over not having been a much better man than Paris, as he had once left similar marks on her flesh, that made him drop his blade and take her back home where according to some accounts he did try to be a better husband, and I'm guessing the fact that Menelaus would have been older and more mature by then might have helped with that, especially with hindsight being twenty/twenty and all."

"Yeah.. And then Helen just jumped in bed with some other sap, talked HIM into killing poor Menelaus and then after a couple of years in adulterously, wedded bliss with that guy she finally got hers in the end when a Fury found her at a river and hung her from a tree as punishment for her crimes. The End.. Why does any of THAT even matter?" Brady asked.

"It matters when we have to have either a defensive or oppositional debate based on one of the main Characters of The Iliad prepared for our next Humanities class." Nathan replied with a roll of his eyes.

"And all of you are going to base your debates in the defense of Helen?"

Sam nodded while Nathan replied with a sympathetic sounding "Helen's easily one of the most debatable characters in the book if you actually care to do any research in areas outside the book… But, no I'm debating in the opposition against Clytemnestra, despite the fact that I'd rather debate in the defense of her character, but Professor Dinklage wanted me to try something different, something more challenging than my normal stances for when I go into the debate against her."

"I also have to do an oppositional debate and I picked Paris pretty much for the same reasons he picked Helen as his character to debate in the defense of." Josh stated with a shrug as he gestured at Sam.

"What about Agamemnon?" Brady asked "He wouldn't have been drug into a war if it hadn't been for his brother's wounded pride."

"For a debate to work, there has to be enough solid ground for TWO SIDES of the debate… And someone debating in the defense of Agamemnon would lose most, if not all their ground if they went with the debate that he was drug into the war by his brother. Because Agamemnon had his own agenda and he actually egged Menelaus into going to war over Helen so he could have the armies that all of Helen's suitor's controlled behind him to help him get to his own agenda.. There's not a lot there to defend honestly, almost everyone would agree he was scum simply because he so very readily sacrificed his own child just to achieve his own goals." Nathan stated with a shake of his head. "And if killing his own daughter wasn't enough, look at how many times he disrespected Achilles, first he lied about promising Iphigenia's hand to him in marriage, then killed Iphigenia which was like a huge dishonor to Achilles, then Agamemnon took Briseis from Achilles just to lord his power over him."

"Yeah, if you were going to debate in the defense of one of the aggressors Odysseus is always a good call, cause you have a whole nother book worth of stuff to use to build the character's defense. Which you'd really need a lot of material since all debated whether for the opposition against or the defense of, a character will all be held against Professor Dinklage."

"Nah.." Brady stated with a wave of his hand "The debates are only allowed to go five minutes so that everyone'll have a turn cause class is only two hours long, so all I'd have to do is find a defense that'll hold water for at least five minutes and I'm as good as gold."

"You do realize that you'll not be only graded by how long you can keep up your side of the debate, but by whatever materials you have on hand to actually back the theories behind your side of the debate, right?" Sam asked.

"Yeah, yeah.. I'll make pie charts and graphs and crap.. Whatever it takes to make my information look legit.. It really won't take a lot to show that Menelaus also had his own agendas and was just using the fact that Helen ran away to Troy as an excuse to gather his big brother as well as several armies behind his 'cause' and go wage war." Brady stated "What about you two?" He gestured to Jessica and Rebecca. "Where'd you guys get your material?"

"Well.. Actually, it's all Sam's.. HE'S the one who did all the research, he just lent us his notes so we could have an idea of how to better formulate our own notes." Jessica replied "I only used his notes to get an idea of what the structure of a defense might look like. But I'm arranging to debate in opposition against Zeus' character."

Rebecca held up her sheet of notes. "It just helped to see the notes of someone who's Pre-law so I could better understand how this mock debate thing would go.. I still don't know who I'm picking to debate in the defense of."

"But you guys had stuff readily available in the defense of Helen too.." Brady trailed off as he looked at Josh and Nathan in confusion.

"Dude.." Josh said with a shake of his head "My chosen Character to debate in the opposition against is Paris, finding stuff out about Helen was gonna be a given.."

"I found stuff about lore on Helen too." Nathan stated "She was Clytemnestra's sister after all.. And there were a lot of parallels between the Characters.. If I were being honest I think that Clytemnestra's biggest beef with Helen was the fact that Helen's first husband was left alive to go to war for her when Paris kidnapped her, while Agamemnon killed Clytemnestra's husband when he kidnapped her, subsequently leaving him free to force her to marry him before he raped her, while Paris was able to rape Helen all he wanted, but, he was not able to have a binding marriage to her as her first husband was still alive.. Basically Clytemnestra held a grudge against her little sister because her little sister still had a chance at being rescued from her captor, while she was chained to her own through a marriage she didn't want."

"That and her daughter Iphigenia was killed just so the men could have enough wind to sail the rest of the way to Troy all because of Helen." Brady said with a sneer.

"Well, actually according to Sam's notes, there's accounts that say Iphigenia was actually Helen's daughter and according to Sam's theories, Helen saw that Iphigenia had an early menses at only four months old- which is actually medically possible, as according to Sam's notes there is a girl who is on record for being the youngest ever to have a menses cycle at only three months old- and she feared that her daughter would meet the same cruel fate as she had, so she faked her daughter's death and begged Clytemnestra to take her daughter as her own so that their father wouldn't be able to marry her off at such a young age as he, not Menelaus, was actually the father of Helen's first daughter and he would have had the right to marry her off like chattle.. And so Clytemnestra took Helen's daughter and renamed her Iphigenia and pretended she was hers and Agememnon's daughter… And what's really sad is that Menelaus probably wouldn't have batted an eye over the fact that Helen's first daughter being conceived by Helen's own father would have meant that Helen was actually pregnant by her own father before they were married or the fact that his marriage to Helen was just a way to cover up her father's shameful and incestuous deed, because as long as he had possession over Helen's beauty, he wouldn't have cared what happened to her body, so long as he always had her conveniently within reach… There's even an account that says Menelaus actually offered Paris the use of Helen's body every night for the first week he was under Menelaus' roof.. So it's clear he didn't mind other men using his wife, just so long as he was the one who got the status boost for being the one to possess her." Rebecca replied with a shrug "I think maybe Clytemnestra resented Helen for several things, but when it came to Iphigenia, I think she had actually tried her best to do right by not only her sister, but the child her sister had trusted her to keep safe and to raise as her own. And there is the possibility that her resentment or hatred of Helen and the idea of going to 'retrieve' Helen, was simply all an act to keep attention shifted away from the idea of sacrificing Iphigenia as much as possible."

"Plus she did have other children to think about and hating Helen was a popular stance amongst most everyone who was there to wage war to get her back into Menelaus' possession. So acting like she hated Helen would have probably felt like the safest stance to take in terms of getting people on her side. Which we all know worked out for her, to a degree in the end, because she was able to bring about the deaths of both Agamemnon and Cassandra and she had, had all of the allies she had made on that island during that time basically backing her play.. Heck, some of those allies even provided men to help make sure that her play went off without a hitch and she was able to remarry AND keep her remaining children safe from whoever might have tried to retaliate against her or her children for her hand in killing Agamemnon." Nathan added… "What?!" He asked sounding surprised "The best way to prepare a good opposing debate is to know what all sorts of things Professor Dinklage might use as a good defensive debate."

Brady looked perturbed "Who's judging the debates anyway?.. I mean it wouldn't be fair if Dinklage is going to debate against all of us, plus be the judge… She can just declare herself the winner."

Rebecca brushed her bangs to the side then leaned across her books and notes and whispered "There's going to be three other Professors who'll judge.. From what I gather, one's the Professor for English Literature, one's from the Drama Department and the other one's from the Law School here on Campus."

"But that can change." Jessica chimed in. "It could always be different Professors to do the judging, so it's best to be as prepared as possible.. I mean, it is counting as half the grade for the entirety of our Second Nine Weeks, after all and honestly, I'd rather do enough work to prepare for a five minute debate than have to write a five page essay any day of the week."

"I think I'd prefer the essay." Brady stated with a groan "I have no idea how to do a debate and I don't want to have to learn how to do a debate.. It's not like I'm Pre-Law, so I don't need to learn how to do that crap."

"Actually you do need to learn how to formulate both sides of a debate, because I know for a fact that you'll have to do at least one debate in English Lit before the end of the Semester." Nathan stated.

"Ugh…" Brady groaned with more dramatic flair "There too?.. WHY?", he whined.

"Because it turns out that learning how to debate is a pretty central necessity to almost any career.." Nathan replied "I mean think about it, Brady… You're a business student you'll eventually have to learn how to pitch sales, how to establish marketing and to be able to do that, you'll have to readily know how to debate at a moment's notice to either defend your sales or marketing plans or to oppose someone else's plans to give yourself a better chance at being the one to get your plans through to the next stage of development. Classes like Humanities and English Lit are required courses for almost every Major, BECAUSE they help people learn how to structure both sides of a debate by actually assigning mock debates throughout the courses of the classes.. Get used to it, dude.. Cause next Semester, there'll be even more mock debates to tackle, and they'll be more difficult because by then we'll be expected to already have knowing how to debate down pat, we're actually lucky that Dinklage eased us into it the way she did."

"I wasn't eased into anything." Brady huffed "I'm pretty sure I was just thrown into the deep end when I wasn't looking."

"And let me guess. You can't swim?" Nathan asked jokingly.

"Hell, no.. I'm drowning here, man." Brady replied with a smirk.

"That's because you're making it out to be a bigger deal than it has to be. Think ninth grade history class.." Josh trailed off with a wave of his hand "Remember that project we had to do on Abraham Lincoln's presidential debates?"

"Yeah.." Brady rolled his eyes, "But that was different I didn't actually have to do the damn debates myself I just had to write about them."

"Wait.. You guys went to high school together?" Sam asked jovially, he'd never actually met people who were friends that had got to be friends for THAT long and he'd never thought about how long Brady might have known Josh, Nathan, Rebecca or Jessica before they had become roommates."

"Yeah, we've known each other since we were both in diapers." Josh replied with a nervous laugh.. Then something, haunted and grieving flickered through Josh's eyes.. "He must be thinking of how off the rails Brady had, went a few months back. That must have been a hard time for him if he's been Brady's friend all that time." Sam reckoned as he studiously went back to his pile of books to continue his diligent research on the character that he had chosen to debate in the defense of as Brady let out a huff and said "Man, I should have just went to clown college or something. I bet they'd never make me learn this stuff there."

Sam did his best not to show how distressed he was over picturing Brady as a clown. He hated… no LOATHED, clowns. They terrified him, still to this day. And as he looked over he had to fight off a wave of panic as he imagined Brady dressed in all those bright colors with all of that.. clown makeup.. covering his face.. Sam shuddered and forced himself to refocus on his books instead of the frightening imagery of Brady dressed as a clown, of clowns in general, really.

Two days after the study group, everyone but Brady had Aced their debates and almost all of Sam's friends credited him with being their biggest source of help when it came to studying and helping with writing notes. And having people treat him as if something he had done, had been not only good and right but USEFUL as well, had given Sam a sense of self-worth that he had never gotten to feel before.

~0~

There are days when Sam gets the uncanny sensation that he's being watched or followed and just as it's about to drive him to the edge of paranoia, the feeling disappears and every time it does, a deep and longing ache to see Dean and his dad fills the void it leaves.

But then he has to lock down all of those feelings of longing and homesickness. Because his dad had made it clear that if he had left he was to stay gone and he doesn't want to risk reaching out to Dean before he has something in place to offer his big brother as some kind of 'out' from the hunting life. So he resists all urges to find his long forgotten cell phone (the one he had brought with him, the one that still had a number his dad and Dean would recognize… Or he hopes they would) and he buries his paranoia down deep and ignores the fact that he honestly believes that he caught a glimpse of a big black beast of a truck with someone who looked remarkably like his father in the driver's seat driving past on at least two occasions. Because it's probably just the fact that he actually misses the man that he saw him when he can't have possibly really been there. And of course, he lives in such deep denial that he refuses to acknowledge that if that were true, he'd be seeing Dean EVERYWHERE, almost all of the time..

Well, there were all those times he's heard the unmistakable beasty roar of a classic muscle car and had turned around feeling elated as he expected to see the Impala with Dean smiling at him from behind the wheel, only to turn around and see that the car was just some classic Corvette or Camaro that did not have neither Dean nor his dad sitting in the driver's seat or passenger seat or back seat (because he'd always find himself scanning all the occupants of the car.. just to be sure), but they couldn't count because they hadn't actually conjured up the image of his brother's face, despite how much he missed him.

But.. Maybe because he had seen so little of his father growing up, his face was actually easier to conjure up images of, because maybe he had seen so little of the man that almost any generic male face with gray-blue-green eyes and a strong jaw line covered in scruff could look like his dad's face. Whereas with Dean's face, he knew almost every freckle on Dean's face, he knew exactly what shade of green Dean's eyes were, so not 'just any' face with green eyes and freckles could possibly look like Dean, unless it was Dean as he knew Dean's face to well to try to replace it with the face of someone else who simply looked 'close enough' to Dean's description… Yeah.. Okay… So Sam KNEW he would know DEAN if he were to actually see HIM, so maybe that was why he was thinking he was catching glimpses of his 'dad' and not 'Dean' in random places at random times…

Sometimes, being with Jessica gives Sam rose colored glasses when he looks back on his own past. Jessica, hadn't exactly had a happy childhood and her horrific tales of an abusive father make Sam start rethinking his views of his own father. Because as it turns out, there are worse parents than John Winchester in the world as there were at least SOME LINES that he knows for a fact that his father would have never crossed.

Hearing Jessica talk about how horrifically she was abused makes Sam wonder, if what he went through as a kid even counts as abuse. Yeah his father had hit him a few times, but he'd never put him in the hospital and the marks that his father had made never left physical scars like the ones Jessica bore on her left shoulder blade.

He starts thinking, that maybe he had judged his own father too harshly especially in light of the proof of what real abuse looks like. No wonder his dad had taken his leaving so personally, the man probably hadn't appreciated knowing how his youngest son viewed him as abusive.

Hearing Jessica speak of the nightmare of a childhood she had endured made him afraid to tell her of his own past, he was afraid that she might hate him the second she found out how wrong he had been when he had ripped apart his relationship with his own father, over the misconception that the man was abusive. He feared that if he told her of such misgivings that she'd see him as just a stupid little boy who had no idea what real abuse felt like.

So he was the rock she could confide in, but when she asked him about his own family, he could only tell her the very few 'civilian friendly' stories that his life had held, because he hadn't wanted to outright lie to the girl he was falling in love with, but he knew he couldn't exactly be forthcoming with the shadier and scarier details of his life before College either.

He felt a twinge of sadness because, for all she knew, he could be a psycho who could turn out more abusive than her father could ever dream of being and yet she always backed down rather than pushing for actual answers about his past. He sometimes wondered if she didn't think enough of herself to even worry whether or not the man she was living with might turn out to be abusive. Which broke his heart even more. He knew that he'd never hurt her, but she didn't know that, not really. How could she?, She hardly knew him.

It made him worry that maybe he could never be good enough for Jessica because she deserved someone who could be completely and unabashedly honest about themselves and their pasts, someone who wouldn't so selfishly hope that she'd be fine with settling for only half truths about his family and childhood for the rest of their lives together.

He hated himself each time he secretly felt grateful that she wouldn't ever press for too many details when he wasn't forthcoming with an abundance of elaborations such as , what his family's 'business' actually was and what sorts of 'unlawful' activities the 'work' most often entailed along with the details of why his family had traveled so much and just why most of his stories never included his father (because his father hadn't really been around to include), as well as just why every time he and Jessica had sex, he would end up crying every time he climaxed, much to his embarrassment.

Every time she passed up the opportunity to press for answers, over the next couple of months, part of him would breathe a sigh of relief while another part of him felt his heart break for her and he found himself praying to god each night, not only for the safety of his brother, but that the woman he cared for didn't press for answers out of fear that he would hurt her. Because it would kill him if Jessica was afraid of him.

It always felt like a fine line. He was constantly torn between the desperate need to just pour his soul out to Jessica because he truly had fallen in love with her and knew she deserved the truth, and the knowledge that even if he did take that leap he still wouldn't deserve her, even if she believed him, because ONE, he had lied (well, omitted too many truths) for so long and TWO, he had been trained from the age of NINE YEARS OLD to be a killer and the real truth of the matter was that he really shouldn't be lose to just roam around society freely, he was probably more dangerous than Charles Manson ever could think to be, yet there he was free to go to College, free to get some pretty, innocent girl like Jessica involved in his screwed up life, that she knew nothing about.. No.. He really didn't deserve her. He knew that he didn't deserve her and the nightmares he'd been having about her lately only served to prove that he really didn't deserve to even be around her, yet he loved her anyway, despite knowing how bad he probably was for her and even though he didn't know why, he couldn't help looking at engagement rings with hopes that he could maybe prove himself wrong about all of it, that maybe he could be honest with her and that he could be good enough to be everything she deserved in a husband, that she deserved to have in the father of her children.

But he couldn't help falling deeper and deeper in love with her with each passing day and he couldn't slow down his rapidly increasing thoughts of getting married to Jessica and starting a family with her no matter how often his logic kept telling him not to 'rush headlong into things'….

And even his and Jessica's conversations lately have been leading to their hypothetical future 'together', he would hint (okay more than hint) at how he'd like to spend his life with her, how he'd love to have a family with her some day and she would always 'hint' that she would like those things too.. They'd both get so into it that they'd end up naming there hypothetical future children.. Jessica was partial to Angel for a girl and Oswald for a boy… But then Sam would HAVE to burst both of their bubbles by bringing up the fact that he'd want to wait till he could afford a proper ring to which she would reply that she's be happy with a ring from a quarter machine, making him wonder if maybe she might already be ready to move onto something that was more than just hypothetical. And then he would chicken out, not because of his normal fears either. But because he knew that if they just dove in without being better prepared that they might end up drowning in a sea of unknowns and he knew that if he was ever going to be the husband that Jessica deserved, then he was going to have to think responsibly, he was going to have to have a responsible plan place.

But he couldn't help the tug.. Couldn't fight the pull and each day brought new thoughts of 'happily wedded bliss', so much so that he let go and allowed himself to just go with it. Because maybe these feelings he'd been having, the inescapable need to rush into taking the next step with Jessica were 'meant to be'…

Yet he couldn't get passed the nagging feeling that there was something unseen, just out of eyeshot, propelling him (pushing him) to act faster than what he had first intended.

So, maybe out of sheer stubbornness and out of spite for the feeling of being propelled into rushing he began to drag his feet. Because if it was 'meant to be' then there was no reason being married and starting a family couldn't wait..

BUT.. Every time he thought about waiting, the stronger the feeling of needing to rush would 'nudge' him from out of nowhere again.

Seeing this made Present day Dean wonder if a 'Cupid' might have been involved with how rapidly Sam's and Jessica's relationship had been moving and Angie looked over at him and nodded as if to say that he was right on the money. An angel, had made Sam and Jessica fall in love and had made sure of the rapid progression in their relationship, which just proved to present day dean, that 'Brady' had been working with at least one angel to ensure that Azazel's grand scheme would go as planned… And of course Sam didn't know or even think that something from his 'old life' might be involved with how rapidly his relationship with Jessica was progressing towards marriage before either Sam or Jessica had even had a chance to graduate college, because Sam was just twenty-one years old and he had never been in love before so he didn't know that what he was feeling wasn't exactly 'normal', he didn't know that the constantly conflicted feelings were anything other than 'cold feet'..

Present day Dean watched as the need to just jump into the deep end with both feet and without a life jacket overtook Sam once again.

But Sam was stubborn… Yes. He did love Jessica, but he did not want to just rush into asking her to marry him without being ready…

First Sam had to research how him and Jessica getting married might affect both of their Grants and Scholarships, then he was going to have to find a Work Study he could qualify for so he could get more credits plus some work experience so he could get through Law School faster than he had, had planned and then hopefully straight into the work force right after he got his License.

He tried not to get too ahead of himself, because part of him knew the odds of Jessica leaving him (more like running from him screaming) the second he told her the truth about his family were high, but at the same time he was not going to ask her to marry him unless she knew the truth about him first…

As much as he knew how high the odds of her leaving him before he could even properly 'pop the question' were, he went ahead and spent all the money he had saved over the last couple of Semesters on a ring that he had, had his eye on for a while now, just in case she did give him a chance to ask her to marry him and he hopes that if he does get a chance to ask her, that she'll say 'Yes.', because he does love her and he wants to be the one that gets to have the privilege of spending the rest of his life with her.

Logically he knows he's rushing into things (he had been hoping to have an actual job before asking Jessica to marry him) and that making the plan to possibly get married so soon, alters the goals he had originally set out to achieve, but he loves her and he's willing to take a leap of faith and hope that everything will work out in the end.

He hides the ring at the back of the closet shelf behind a teddy bear he had won for Jessica at a carnival during their second 'official' date because he wants to wait till after his Law School interview to ask her.

A week before he is scheduled to have an interview with the law school on campus, Jessica talks him into letting off some steam by going to a Halloween party. He's not fond of Halloween, but he loves her, so he goes and he even lets himself have a good time with Jessica and a combination of all of their friends…

After almost everyone else dispersed it was just him, Jessica and Nathan, when Jessica proposed a toast to him and the fact that he had gotten a perfect score on his LSAT's and it means more to him now, than if the toast had been made in front of all the others, because Jessica is the woman he loves and Nathan is the closest thing he's had to a best friend outside of Dean.

The three of them do a bit of celebrating, then Nathan bids them farewell and Jessica gives Sam a smile that says she's ready to leave the party, but not ready to 'stop celebrating' just yet and he can't help the anticipation and arousal that tingles low in his belly, because he loves how Jessica 'celebrates' their happy moments in the bedroom.

And when they get to their door, they're a mess of tangled limbs and clothing that they're trying to shed before they even get into their apartment.

At some point they make it to the bed, and like magic, they're down to their underwear. Jessica makes her way down the plane of Sam's body and stops to playfully nibble on his abs, which tickles.

Sam guffaws in genuine laughter as he tries to roll away and protect his ticklish middle, but Jessica won't have any of that. She straddles his hips and keeps him in place so she can taste, nibble and tease him at her discretion. Sam loves it when she takes control like this, it makes him tingle and ache in all the best ways and he never wants this feeling to stop.

Jessica works her way back up and nibbles at his ear, under his jaw then she nuzzles the underside of his chin with her nose as she breaths in his scent.

Sam threads his fingers in her hair and cups the back of her neck, gently requesting her mouth to meet his and she obliges. Of all the things he loves about Jessica, he loves just simply kissing her the most.

When she pulls back he looks up at her and she looks down at him and Sam is mesmerized by how beautiful she is, how kind and gentle she is and his heart fills with so much love he feels like it will burst and he finds that he can't wait to ask her to marry him.

"Hang on a sec… There's something that I really want to ask you.." He whispered as he shifts them to where Jessica can settle beside him and he could slip out of bed.

He had been planning to wait.. But now that urge to rush into asking her to marry him was all consuming. He started to pull down the teddy bear at the top of the closet so he could get to the ring behind it..

"Sam, wait.." Jessica suddenly sounded nervous as she clamored out of bed.. "I have something I have to tell you.."

Suddenly Sam was taken aback. "What?" he felt his heart plummet, because he was suddenly terrified she might want to break up with him.

She must have caught his shocked and scared expression "It's nothing bad.. I promise.. I just… Uh… I wanted to wait until after your interview next week so that we could have even more to celebrate.."

"You saw what was on top of the closet shelf didn't you?"

"Maybe.." Jessica said looking embarrassed.

"And?.." Sam was full on panicking now.. she had seen the ring..

"And.. I want you to ask me next week, so when I say yes, we'll have even more to celebrate, cause I have no doubt you'll ace that interview."

"Oh my god, Jessica!" Sam exclaimed as he scooped her up and spun her around.. "You just made me the happiest guy on the planet!"

"Sam… You're supposed to pretend I never saw it!.."

"But I can't.." Sam whined "Why can't I give it to you right now?"

"Cause I know that you wanted to wait until at least after the interview for one, and for two… I kinda want us to be wearing a bit more clothes when you ask me… What?! Proposing in your undies wouldn't have been your smoothest of moves, Winchester."

"Oh really?"

"Really… You wanna ask me to marry you, you gotta bring you're 'A Game', Mister.."

"Oh consider my A game brung…" Sam stated jokingly "I'm gonna buy you flowers and take you out to a nice fancy restaurant and I'm gonna get a violinist to play your favorite song.."

"Oh, so you are gonna earn that yes after all then, huh?"

"You better believe it." Of course what Jessica didn't know was that he'd already made reservations to one of the fanciest restaurants in town, plus preparations for an up and coming violinists to play Jessica's favorite song over a week ago..

"And I'll spend the rest of my life giving you my best and trying to earn every single yes after that."

"Mmm... I like it… Maybe you can work on earning a yes now.."

"Sounds good to me.." He replied in a husky voice as Jessica began to remove his boxers.

Before Sam knew it they were both naked and back on the bed..

He is so tender and gentle with her as he caresses her, because she deserves no less than to be worshiped and he intends to gently worship every inch of her for as long as she will let him.

He runs his hands up her sides and as goes to cup her breasts he looks up in silent question to see if this is okay. They've made love several times since being together, but he always, always watches where he puts his hands and he always asks for permission, because he knows that she has triggers all over her body and he doesn't ever want to be the one that sends her mind back to a place she feared she would never escape the first time.

Jessica takes a deep breath as if she's bracing herself, then she nods and helps guide Sam's hands to her breasts where she deliberately places his thumbs over her nipples.

Sam circles the slowly stiffening buds with the pads of his thumbs. "Like this?", he asks in a whisper that would almost sound shy, if it didn't sound like pure debauchery as Jessica slides herself down on his erect manhood and pulls a moan from him in the last second.

"Yes.." She whispers with a relieved and immensely pleasured sigh "Just like that."..

He and Jessica are both still young, so when they go to take a shower, they end up making love in the shower as well and when they have both reached yet another climax together, they climb out and exhaustedly make their way back into the bedroom where Sam pulled on some sweats and a tee shirt and Jessica pulled on some boy shorts and her favorite 'Smurfs' shirt as she can stand to have her stomach and legs exposed when she sleeps, but she hates to sleep with her shoulder blades bared, then they snuggled together under the covers and drifted off to sleep…

Present day Dean, watches as the scene fades to grey, but then a noise comes out of nowhere and the grey is instantly flooded by colors.

Sam's senses are still sharp, even after more than a couple of years.

Sam creeps cautiously towards where the noise had come from. He's expecting just about anything from bird that might have gotten in through the open window to an angry spirit or a burglar.

He sees a shadow pass in front of the door and so he tucks himself against the wall and hides in shadow as what he's assuming to be some kind of prowler or thief enters the room.

When the man (at least he's sure it's a man, because according to his experiences in life, it could be any number of things) passes him, he steps out and tries to grab him (it?) from behind, but the man's reflexes are quick and the next thing he knows he's fighting a shadow. For one wild second he thinks he (it) doesn't have a face and that maybe this is some new messed up dream, because the shadow is built just like..

He's flung to the floor which throws him out of his thoughts and the shadow leans in and the outside light reveals a face..

"Whoa.. Easy tiger.."

Sam couldn't believe his eyes, he couldn't believe his ears..

"Dean?"

The twenty-six year old Dean gave a chuckle…

"You scared the crap out of me.." Sam said, sounding indignant..

"That's cause you're out of practice.."

The twenty-one year old Sam proved his big brother wrong by rolling them and pinning Dean.

"Or not.." past Dean said with a huffed out half chuckle then he groaned "Get off of me."

For someone who had been missing his big brother for so long, Sam went from happy to worried, to a little pissed then geared it down to indignation all within the blink of an eye as he asked "Dean, what are you doing here?"

"I was looking for a beer."

Sam's went from feeling indignant back to pissed "What the hell are you doing here?"

"Okay.. Alright.." Past Dean was now the one who sounded indignant. "We got to talk."

"Uh.. The phone.."

"If I had called would you have picked up?"

Sam had never felt so hurt in his life, his big brother's words were like a punch to the gut.

Of course he would have picked up. He always would have picked up. In fact he kept his old cell phone charged for just in case Dean ever did call. But he didn't get a chance to say any of that, because light poured into the room and Jessica stood in the doorway..

"Sam?" Her tone was inquisitive, but there was a hint of fear there to that only Sam could recognize. He knows who she had thought had gotten into their apartment. And Sam wants to remind her that her father can't find her now, her mother's parents had made sure of that when they had gotten her away from the bastard and whisked away to the other side of the country.

But before he can reassure her, he has to get Dean out of ear shot because he knows how Jessica feels about the things she's told him and how she wants those things to stay between the two of them. So he makes a quick introduction "Jess, hey.. dean.. This is my girlfriend Jessica.."

"Wait… Your brother Dean?"

"I love the Smurfs." Past Dean states as he adopts the cocky swagger he used to use all the time to try to pick up women "You know, I got to tell you.. You are completely out of my brother's league.."

Past Dean hadn't seen how uncomfortable his 'harmless flirting' was making her… He hadn't even realized that his statement could have been taken two different ways and as Jessica nervously said something about putting on more clothes Present day Dean wonders if she had wanted to cover up because she had felt insulted that someone she hadn't even known had just basically told her she wasn't good enough for Sam, or if she was wanting to cover up because she was suddenly afraid that this guy who Sam claimed to be his brother, who was looking at her like a lion looks at a raw lamb chop, might suddenly assume her lack of skin coverage might seem like an invitation to just attack her right then and there.

And as Past Dean shook his head and replied "No, no, I wouldn't dream of it.. Seriously." It's a wonder she hadn't taken off running , but it had spoken volumes of her level of trust in Sam.. The 'Cupid' must have hooked her good and proper.

It had also spoke volumes of Sam's trust in his big brother.. Apparently he had trusted his big brother to dial it down.. And Past Dean had.. He had dialed it down, he had just been a bit of a jackass before he had realized he needed to dial it down because he was trying to hit on his little brother's girlfriend, right in front of his little brother, and had clearly made her nervous and uncomfortable.

Present day Dean was looking back on that time and realizing he had not only been an ass of EPIC proportions but he had also been a horrible human being for not even trying to consider how or why his openly flirtatious behavior might not be something all women would welcome. He looks back on that time and wonders just how many women had thought he was creepy, how many women had given him a fake phone number because they had been too afraid of openly rejecting him because of how aggrieve his flirting could sometimes seem.

Dean had told Jessica that he needed to 'Borrow her boyfriend." To talk about some 'private family business'

And Sam had stood firm as he said "No. Whatever you want to say, you can say in front of her.", in all honesty, Sam had been hoping that Dean would start an outpouring of talk about Ghosts, Werewolves, something supernatural, because then the secret would be out and Jessica would know, because if he were to be honest. He still wanted free from all that and he wanted Jessica to understand how he had cut those things out of his life, but he would never cut DEAN or his father out of his life, even if they refused to leave hunting. And he had been hoping that the secret would come out, that Jessica would finally know and understand and that she would still love him and want to be with him.

But then Dean had said that their dad had been 'on a hunting trip' and he had 'been gone for a few days' and suddenly Sam didn't want to drag Jessica into the middle of a talk about an actual ACTIVE hunt… Because he could handle Jessica hearing Dean asking for his help with a hunt that hadn't begun yet, but he couldn't handle Dean talking about a hunt that was already ongoing, a hunt their father had disappeared during, because he knew how the details he'd be comfortable with Jessica learning so quick off the bat would hinge on what the next words out of Dean's mouth were going to be and whether or not their father had possibly done something so illegal that he couldn't risk Jessica being drug into it and charged for 'Aiding and Abetting'. Because he's pretty sure she'd be pissed at him if his father's antics landed her in a cell just because she had known too much about something the illegal the man had done.

So he asked her to excuse them, saying that he and Dean needed to go outside.

When Sam learned that their father was indeed just simply 'missing' and that Dean wanted his help finding the man, Sam became aggravated. Because their father was always 'missing' and he was always fine. And hearing Dean say that he just knew that something was wrong. That their father was 'in trouble' this time he just knew it made Sam pissed, because their father didn't have the right to do this crap to Dean. John Winchester didn't have the right to disappear on Dean and keep him worried for weeks and Sam knew that this was just another one of his father's ways of ditching his son while keeping that son loyally, and eagerly, waiting in the wings for when he needed to use him… And worse than that, their father had let dean start hunting ALONE, as if hunting period, wasn't dangerous enough as it was their father had let Dean, his own son, go it on his own… Yes, Sam knew that his father had a goal, but when getting to that goal proved to require that he put his own children in harm's way.. Well.. Nothing should have been worth risking the safety of his children… Not even bringing his wife's killer to justice.

Why couldn't Dean see that all, their father cared about was how he could use him?

God.. He did not want to have to go searching for his father, because one, he was certain that the man truly was held up drunk somewhere, and two, he really wanted Dean to see he had other options.

But then Dean had said that he didn't want to 'do this' alone.. And he knew that if he did say no, that Dean would not consider any other options, that Dean would go off into the hunt their father was last on, and he would go alone.

Sam could hear his father's voice telling him he would be the reason Dean died, echoing in his mind and he was suddenly plagued by flashes of that same old nightmare.. His brother being ripped apart by an invisible monster…

"What was he hunting?"

Dean showed him pictures of all the hitchhikers that had gone missing and then played the voicemail recording that was loaded with E.V.P., and Sam had instantly known… Their father had been hunting a ghost…

So, Sam had agreed to go on the one condition that he got brought back before that coming Monday for his Law School interview.

Then he went up and started packing..

"Wait, you're taking off?" Jessica asked sounding confused "Is this about your dad?.. Is he alright?" Now she sounded worried and maybe even a little afraid..

"Yeah.. You know, just a little family drama.." Sam replied as he sarcastically thought to himself 'my dad just probably got himself eaten by a monster or locked up in jail and that's only if he was sober enough to stand up long enough to cause a nuisance to either a monster or to cops, but it's no big deal, really'..

"But your brother said he was on some kind of a hunting trip.."

"Oh, yeah, he's just deer hunting up at the cabin.." Sam says nonchalantly as he tries to make his father's drinking problem seem like it's really not such a big deal "And he's probably got 'Jim', Jack' and 'Jose' along with him. We're just gonna go bring him back. "

"What about the interview.

"I'll make the interview.. This is only for a couple of days.."

"Sam.. I mean.. Please.. Just stop for a second.. You're sure you're okay?"

"I'm fine.."

Jessica seemed very tentative about the words she chose next "It's just.. You never even talk about your family and now you're taking off to spend a weekend with them and with Monday coming up.. which is kind of a huge deal.."

"Hey.. Everything's gonna be okay, I will be back in time I promise." Sam told her before giving her a kiss on the cheek and heading out..

"At least tell me where you're going!.." Jessica called after him.. But Sam had to get out of there before he spouted more lies to cover up for his father's illegal deeds so he had darted out, pretending to have not heard her calling after him…

~0~

Being back on the road with Dean made Sam feel nostalgic. He had missed the unique smell of the Impala's interior and as much as he had complained about it, he had missed the sound of his brother's music.. And as he sat there looking through his brother's tapes he asked Dean 'how' he had paid for the 'food' and the gas and wasn't surprised when Dean confirmed that he and their dad had still been conducting credit-card scams.. Dean had stated 'All we do is apply, it's not our fault they send us the cards.".. Sam really wanted to retort "Explain that to the judge when you get sentenced to prison for Credit-card fraud and possibly even Identity Theft..".. But instead he had settled for asking whose name Dean had used on the applications 'this time', because he'd need to know it for later when he stood as defense council for Dean and their father should a 'Bert and Hector Aframian' actually exist as the Identity Theft would get them more time than the credit-card fraud and adding the two illegal offenses together… The thought made Sam shudder, Dean and their father were looking at a lot of time in jail if they were ever caught and didn't have a good lawyer to defend them.. Thank god he was well on his way to becoming a lawyer because at the rate Dean and their dad was going, they'd be needing one pretty soon… Then Dean had called him 'Sammy' for the umpteenth time in just the last few hours, and it had struck a nerve that was raw for reasons he couldn't explain "You know, Sammy is a chubby twelve year old.. It's Sam..", the music had been cranked up to an eardrum bursting level as Dean childishly claimed to not be able to hear him as they pulled away from the gas station.

When they got closer to the town they were headed towards they caught sight of a bunch of cops gathered at a bridge. Dean pulled to the side of the road, figuring it was worth checking out and when he grabbed a box full of fake badges, Sam was flabbergasted. This was so much worse than Sam had first thought.

Not only were Dean and their father still committing credit-card fraud, but they were also still committing felony level offenses such as Impersonating A Federal Officer and Dean wasn't leaving him a lot of options other than to go along with it.. Which served to remind him just why he had wanted away from hunting. Because not only was he running the risk of watching his family die, but he was running the risk of watching them get carted off to jail too.. Oh, not to mention he was risking his own life and his own freedom as well, every time he let himself get drug into a hunt.

His point was proven when the next day, Dean was hauled off to jail leaving him in the precarious position of calling nine-one-one and reporting 'shots fired' over on Whitefield Road.. Later when dean jokingly said "Fake nine-one-one phone call, Sammy, I don't know.. that's pretty illegal." Sam had simply replied "Don't I know it." and well, Dean would never have to know that he had actually shot off a couple of rounds into the night sky just so he wouldn't exactly be lying when he called it in…

When Constance popped up in the middle of the road, he had slammed on the brakes, making Dean panic. But he couldn't reassure his brother because suddenly Constance appeared behind him and demanded he take her home. He been afraid as he told her 'No.'... Because she couldn't hurt him, he had never been unfaithful, but then she had somehow taken over the Impala and had used it to drive there herself after locking a panicking Sam inside with her and taking him along for the ride despite how many times he tried to open the door and fling himself from the speeding car. And then he tried talking her down, because talking is his strength and so is listening, he hopes to get through to the part of her that was once human.. Saying "Don't do this.", and he had felt her sadness as if it were his own as she said "I can never go home.", he knew how she felt, then he realized "You're scared to go home." she disappeared and Sam knew that she was readying herself to attack him.. He tried telling her that he had never been unfaithful and she had simply stated "You will be.", as she climbed on top of him and started forcefully kissing him against his will before she started trying to rip out his heart causing him to scream in anguish because it felt like she was ripping away something more fundamental than just his heart, it felt like she was digging away at his ability to love, it felt like she was trying to rip out his soul and he was so sure that even dying could never hurt as much as she was hurting him right then… Suddenly shots rang out and the driver's side window shattered, causing Constance to flicker ever so slightly before she reappeared full force and started trying to dig his soul out all over again. More shots rang out, causing Constance to vanish temporarily.. But long enough for him to get the Impala started and put in Drive..

He gave a growl "I'm taking you home." Right before he gunned it and drove the Impala straight into what had once been Constance's home and then watched as the spirits of Constance's children drug her into the afterlife and even after she had tried to kill him he still couldn't help hoping that she and her children had found peace and happiness in a place they could be together as she hadn't been in her right mind when she had done what did and Sam didn't believe she deserved to go to hell for crimes she had committed in a moment of insanity.. Plus something about a 'case' where a distraught parent drowned their children in a moment of insanity struck a chord with him for a reason he couldn't quite put his finger on but he knows that certain things about this 'case' had almost felt personal in a vague way..

The ghost that had caused all this trouble had been taken care of, but now Sam was more confused than ever.. Because his father had never taken off in the middle of a hunt except once.. He shuddered at the hazy memory of his father slapping him for the first time then thundering away at him, for causing the death of a good hunter, someone who had been worth more than he could ever hope to be worth… He knows there's something about that time that he had forgotten, that he should remember and it's like an itch he can't scratch out, like something is blocking him from remembering something important.. But he can't stay focused long enough to pick at the slowly forming cracks in the barrier, because his father had left in the middle of a hunt… His father wouldn't have done that unless something of epically major importance had come up and from what he knows about his dad, HUNTING is the only thing his father seems to consider as truly important.. So it had to have ben a bigger hunt, which meant one thing, his father had some kind of real lead on the thing that had killed his mom…

Present day Dean looks back on that time and realizes how intuitive his little brother was.. But sadly.. Sam had thought their dad being hot on that "thing's" trail meant that 'the hunting life' was about to be over for good, because Sam had believed that his father would find the thing that killed their mom, then kill the thing that had killed their mom and then their father would quit hunting, would give up chasing things that could gut him or his big brother for good and maybe settle down, which Sam had hoped would mean that Dean would settle down.. Boy had Sam been wrong.. Things had turned out so far from what Sam had imagined back then that it wasn't funny..

When Dean dropped Sam back off at his apartment, Sam had been tempted to stay on the road with Dean until they found their dad.. But Sam wanted to be on the sidelines for if their dad or his big brother did something that would require getting bailed out of jail, so despite how badly he wanted to be with his family, he bid Dean goodbye, because he could not go back to hunting, he had other things to think about, like how to help his family transition away from hunting when they were finally ready to give it up.. And god, he was hoping that they would BOTH be ready to give it up, soon…

When he went into the apartment, there was a plate of chocolate chip cookies on the kitchen table with a note that read "Missed you! Love you!"

Sam smiled as he grabbed a cookie and began to nibble on it.. He finally felt like everything might turn out okay after all as his dad was sure to quit hunting after the thing that killed his mother was dead, which meant that both his dad and his big brother would be safe, and he had his Law School interview in just a few hours and then a romantic dinner to get ready for and a proposal to make that he hope Jessica's answer would still be 'Yes.' To…

He felt lighter than he had in a very long time as he went into the bedroom and heard the shower running and saw the steam billowing from the cracked open bathroom door. He closed his eyes and plopped backwards, feeling truly happy for the first time in what had seemed like forever.. But that feeling hadn't lasted more than a few seconds, because he felt something drip onto his forehead and made the mistake of opening his eyes…

Sam gasped as he looked up and saw Jessica, pinned to the ceiling.. It was like all of the nightmares he'd been having the last two and a half months had all rushed in to hit him at once and struck him in the chest, lashing out and making his nightmares real..

Oh, god… It couldn't be real.. It couldn't..

"No!", he screamed as Jessica's body burst into flames that rapidly began to consume the room.

The next thing Sam knew, Dean was dragging him out no matter how hard he fought to try to go back in, to try to save her.

He knows at some point he had cried, had wailed. But nothing had detoured Dean from dragging him from the burning building.

After he had gotten his wits about him enough to catch a halfway solidly formed thought, the first thing Sam had done was go to the trunk of the Impala where he started methodically checking the weapons one by one, preparing them for battle as he was ready to wage a war the likes no hunter nor monster had ever seen. When Dean made his way back over, Sam silently acknowledged him as he tried to sniff back a few tears, then he tossed the last gun into the trunk saying "We've got work to do."..

Dean had been what had kept him grounded, had been what had kept him from flying apart and shattering like an old and brittle porcelain doll and he had been so grateful to have Dean by his side when he needed his big brother most, because without Dean there to hold him together he would have fallen apart.

Going through the apartment trying to se if anything could be salvaged, had been difficult, but he had wanted to do it alone, his life with Jessica, the ways they enjoyed certain things together wasn't anyone's business but theirs and he respected Jessica enough to not want anyone to see the things she would have preferred to keep private, so he had Dean wait downstairs in the Impala.. There were some parts of the apartment that were seemingly untouched by the fire, like an old nightstand that sat beside the bed had made it through, remarkably, seemingly unscathed save for some smoke damage that could eventually be repaired with a little T.L.C… He gently pried open the drawers for fear they would turn to ash in his hand.. Kind of like his life had.. Inside one, he found a necklace Jessica's mom had given her before she had passed away from Cancer when Jessica was ten, he tucked it into his pocket for her grandparents as he knew how much it meant to her grandmother, then he found the necklace that he had given Jessica right after they had moved in together, that one he tucked into his pocket on the other side because he was keeping that for himself. He found a few pictures that had made it through the fire also resting, nestled safely in that drawer and he picked a few to keep for himself and he packed the others into a small box to give to her grandparents, such as one where Jessica's mom was holding her as a baby..

Then he pried open the closet.. The teddy bear that the ring he had bought to propose with had been hidden behind seemed untouched by n=both flames and smoke. He grabbed the little guy down and hugged him close. He still smelled faintly like the perfume that Jessica had been wearing the night he was won at the carnival. Sam took a few more seconds to really capture that scent, he wanted Jessica to have this, even if he had to sit him her headstone, this bear was hers and he was leaving it with her.. He tried not to think about the 'why' and the 'how' that was behind the nature of his leaving, because he knew he was going to go on the road to find the bastard that had killed her, that he was going to devote himself to a life he had sworn he was done with at least until the monster that had taken Jessica from the people who loved her, was dead…

He found the ring box.. This was Jessica's too and he planned to give it to her grandmother in hopes that she would understand its significance and that she would allow it to be buried with Jessica. When he went to grab the ring box, something else came sliding off of the top shelf with it.

At first Sam looked at the white stick that landed at his feet in confusion as he wondered what it was, he stared down at it for at least ten minutes, trying to process what the pink plus sign in the little window meant and when he finally shook himself from his numb revelry, he felt his heart shatter as his mind finally let him realize what it was.

His knees hit the floor and he cradled that little stick to his chest and he wept and he wailed and he screamed through clenched teeth as he tried to hold it all in and failed miserably…

He bawled grievously as he stuttered out "I'm so sorry.. Angel, I'm so sorry." Because somehow he just knew, that the baby would have been a girl…


	13. Chapter 6. Part 8.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

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> If you go and read this on FF.net you'll see all the A/N's I wrote.. There were so many.. Anyway.. Chapter 6 was being Edited and rewritten in some places in a few "parts" because after initially splitting it up I had to work on making each Chapter end exactly the way I wanted it to for IMPACT REASONS .. It had originally been why Chapter 6 had been posted all together all at once (until someone pointed out how huge the Chapter was) because I didn't want to lose tge IMPACT of the Chapter as a whole.. But .. Splitting it up was necessary even though I sacrificed some impact from the Chapter as a whole.. Also I had to correct a few mistakes that were made.. And there are STILL huge mistakes all over the place on the original at FF.net that I still haven't fixed a few of those obviously made their ways over here because I didn't catch them.. Copy/Paste makes me miss a few things .. If I catch it I'll fix it.. So there may be minor Edits to the Chapters of this story here on AO3 later..

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..

Present day Dean stood watching with tears streaming down his face.. Sam hadn't just lost the woman he had loved(whether or not there was angelic intervention involved), the woman he had wanted to spend the rest of his life with, but Sam had also lost his child.. A child he would have loved more than anyone or anything in the Universe, a child he would have devoted his entire existence to just so he could have personally been sure of her safety and happiness.. But her life had been taken before he had ever had the chance to know about her.

Knowing the true depth of Sam's loss made so many things make so much sense all of the sudden.. Like Sam's panicky desperation to find their father.. Because he had known that there were things that John Winchester knew about the Yellow Eyed Monster that no one else knew.. Because John Winchester was a secretive bastard who had a habit of withholding vital information even when it could mean that sharing that information could save someone's life.. Present day Dean could guess that Sam had probably been hoping to crack that secretive shell for once and find out everything he would have needed to know, because surely John knowing the 'thing' had also taken his grandchild would do something to spur John into sharing everything that Sam had needed to know.. And after everything he had witnessed from Sam's horrible childhood, Present day Dean is almost certain that Sam had been giving their father too much credit because he doubted that John Winchester would have had any kind of sense of duty to his grandchild as it was now clearly obvious the only thing that had been important to John Winchester was JOHN WINCHESTER and his OWN cause.. And Present day Dean knew now that John Winchester would have thrown anyone and everyone besides his own self, under the bus just so he could achieve his own cause.. John Winchester hadn't given a crap that he had knowingly and willingly endangered the safety and happiness of his own children, to him it had been worth it to sacrifice his own children, his own flesh and blood, his last living connection to a wife he continuously claimed to love.. If John had really loved Mary the way he constantly claimed, he would have not done what he did to HER sons, he would not have found some other woman to take to bed and he wouldn't have run to her at random to live a secret 'apple pie life' after finding out he had a twelve year old son by her.. Present day Dean looked back at the time when Sam had left for Stanford.. How John had just taken off one day with no real explanation, leaving Past Dean on his own for DAYS without any clue what he was supposed to do and now Present day Dean KNOWS that back then, John had just been running off to meet his 'other son', and then had at random points, run (SNUCK) off to go live a secret 'apple pie life' with HIM and his mom, after cutting a NINETEEN YEAR OLD, SAM down for wanting the same kind of 'normal' the same kind of 'safe', right after telling Sam that if HE left to try to go have his own normal and safe that he could never come back.. John Winchester was a hypocrite and a manipulative bastard who had only wanted his way and if he had truly loved the wife he had sworn he was trying to avenge, he would have never drug her sons into something as dangerous as hunting monsters, ghosts and demons, if John had truly loved Mary he would have made sure to give her sons safe and relatively happy lives.. If John had truly loved Mary he would have given Sam and Dean the same kind of lives he kept shamefully secreting away to give to Adam... But no.. Sam and Dean had, had to become John's SOLDIERS, while Adam got to be John's SON and John had, had the nerve of cutting SAM out for finally escaping the way his 'father', 'drill sergeant' kept trying to define him.

Present day Dean wanted to claw out his own hair.. He was beyond pissed as he realized not only his father's hypocrisy, but his own as well.. He had cut Sam down for going to Stanford at every opportunity back then, when at least Sam had been straight up about what he was doing and where he was going, when the man he had practically worshipped had been going behind his back to live the kind of life he had begrudged Sam for seeking out, their father had been going behind his back and giving some other kid a childhood that he had refused to give Mary's sons and Past Dean had been blind and only seeing how he felt that his little brother SAM had betrayed him.. All he had been able to see back then was his resentment at Sam for Sam having the nerve to run away, for having the nerve to ABANDON him.. and now as he looks back on that time all he can feel is resentment at himself for hurting the one person who he continuously claimed meant more to him than his own life…

He watched as Past Sam finally gathered his wits and strength enough to force himself to stand.. Sam was numb now, but even the numbness was painful. Sam steeled himself and walled off his pain as much as possible as he gathered the rest of what could be salvaged, then he placed what he was sending to Jessica's grandparents in one box, what he was taking with him into either another box or straight into his duffle bag and what he was taking to rest on Jessica's grave once it had been sealed over, into another, the little cream colored teddy bear he had won her would go on top of her grave now as his own tender representation of his hope that both she and their child had somehow escaped to a plain ABOVE death.. He wanted to do something MORE, but the teddy bear was all he really had that could represent both Jessica and Angel.

The positive pregnancy test was wrapped lovingly in Sam's finest handkerchief and placed straight into an inside pocket of his duffle bag where kept all of his most cherished of small trinkets such as the necklace of Jessica's that he was keeping and the small clipping of newspaper he had wrapped the Amulet he had given to Dean so many years ago, in.. As Present day Dean realized his brother had found a way to hold onto the exact same clipping of newspaper he had wrapped the Amulet in, he understood that Sam had simply been desperate to try to hold on to all of the good things, even back before he had 'officially' found out about all the 'bad things' that could exist in the world… And it made Present day Dean hate himself and his father even more because they hadn't given Sam more good things to hold onto..

Once Past Sam had everything gathered and his emotions effectively closed off behind walls of steel he journey back downstairs with the boxes stacked on top of one another and his duffle bag hanging from his shoulder so he would not have to go back up to that burned out shell of his home, his LIFE, ever again…

The road, the Impala, those were his home again now, and hunting was the only life he could bear to even think about letting himself have right then..

All he wanted to focus on was finding the thing that killed Jessica and their daughter. He didn't care about any other monsters and he already knew that HE couldn't save lives, not really. All he cared about was ending ONE monster.. ONE.. As far as the rest of the monsters in the world were concerned.. Well, he's willing to live and let live so long as they don't threaten the lives of what's left of his family and as long as they don't get in his way..

Past Sam and Past Dean stick around Stanford for a few more days.. Sam attends Jessica's funeral, Dean is there too, standing out in the distance leaning against the Impala, waiting for Sam.. Sam waits until the earth has closed over the casket, until after everyone else has had their own moment to pay their respects before dispersing back to the vehicles of the funeral procession.. When Sam goes to have his moment with Jessica (His LAST moment with Jessica, and their unborn daughter who probably never got to have a heartbeat, but she DOES get to have a name), he is alone and no one can hear what he says to Jessica, what he says to their little girl..

Present day Dean, he wants to turn away from this… He hadn't been squicked out (Not as much as he should have been anyway) through witnessing Sam making love, through actually feeling what Sam had felt when he reached that highly personal moment of climax (And isn't THAT all kinds of messed up?), but this.. THIS is too personal, too private, he feels like this should be SAM'S and that it should stay SAM'S and only SAM'S alone, Sam's, Jessica's and Angel's.. And thankfully, Angie must understand, because what Sam says to them becomes muted out.. But he can still feel Sam's pain, Sam's grief, and that in itself hurts more than anything his own heart can bear.. He wonders how Sam held it all in, how Sam dealt with it all alone… How Sam came out of this with his mind even halfway intact… How Sam came out of this with any kindness and love at all still left in his heart and soul… Because Dean knows for a fact that something like that can make a person's heart turn to stone and lose its light and love, faster than almost anything else in the Universe.. Except, he didn't lose Ben and Lisa to death the way Sam lost Jessica and Angel.. And Emma, Sam was right about Emma, she wasn't his, not really and even if she had been, she had clearly made her choice, which had forced Sam to make an even harder choice.. But Present day Dean knows now that Sam would have let Emma go if she had only just stopped trying to pose a threat to the only person left alive that Sam cared about… And if she had, then maybe Sam could have come to care about her too, but in that moment, Present day Dean knows that Sam had saw only a threat to his big brother. That was the apparently the only line Sam had seemingly ever really drawn.. And now Dean knew that Emma had forfeited being Sam's family the second she had crossed that line…

And what's harder to bear is he knows he would have put a bullet in her same as Sam had, if she had made a move to go at Sam. He would have killed his own kid (except she wasn't REALLY his… turns out the 'Amazon Race' come out with only their female parent's DNA.. apparently all the male parent's DNA is eradicated before the embryo is even formed.. Sam had waited a couple of days to let him mourn the idea of her, then he had tentatively showed him all the research he had done to prove she hadn't been his.. But part of him still sees Emma as his daughter) to protect Sam, because he would not have chosen something he knew had actually chosen to be a killer over Sam.. Sam had simply kept that guilt off of his big brother's shoulders by doing the only thing he could that was both right by Dean and right by Emma, Sam killed her before she could do something that would have made her truly a monster… And now Present day Dean looks back on a time when Sam had begged his big brother to kill him.. To kill him if he ever became 'something he's not' and now he understand what Sam was asking of him.. And now he knows Sam had just given Emma something Sam had simply just wanted for himself back when it still could have made a difference.. Except, Present day Dean knows now that if he had been able to do what Sam had asked of him, if he had been able to kill Sam in the moments he had truly thought Sam was going darkside, that it wouldn't have changed anything, in fact it probably would have made things worse, because he gets it now that ZACHARIAH would have always found a way to bring Sam back to force Sam into following down his own path, playing 'the part' he ended up playing, he doesn't have to see to know that Zachariah had more to do with EVERYTHING Sam had ended up doing than his Past Self had actually cared to try to think about.. Because now the words Zachariah had said to him on that faithful night The Cage opened and Lucifer sprang free is ringing in his ears, haunting him "Sam has a part to play… A very important part… He may need a little 'nudging' in the right direction.. But I'LL make sure he plays it.".. and he understands now, that Sam's whole life had been manipulated, even this horrible loss of Sam's daughter, all to ensure that Sam would be 'nudged' down whatever path that Zachariah wanted him to go down.. He understands the difference between Emma and Sam.. Emma made a choice.. She choose to be a killer and Sam stopped her, he saved her before she could become that, he saved her, even from herself.. (Turns out there's more than just one way to save a person and Present day Dean wishes he had understood that a little better back then, because he can't deny that he had hated Sam just a little for killing Emma up until recently, anyway), whereas Sam had not chosen to be a killer he had tried to be anything but a killer, and only when pressed with his back to the wall or presented with his family in danger, did Sam willingly kill.. And when Sam had killed Lillith, he had done so while thinking that, that was what had to be done to SAVE THE WORLD.. Even Past Dean had thought so until Castiel had told him otherwise.. The difference is, that Sam had chosen to try to be good and to try to do good.. It just sucks that the poor kid had, had both demons and (some) ANGELS working against him to use all of his good intentions for nefarious purposes…

Present day Dean watches as Past Sam lays a cream colored teddy bear beside Jessica's headstone and knows now that, that was the same bear from the top of Sam's closet whereas Past Dean hadn't known that, he hadn't even really paid all that much attention to what all Sam had taken to lay on Jessica's grave, besides just the flowers and he hadn't ever asked about the things Sam had kept. And now he's left to wonder if maybe he should have at least asked about Sam's life at Stanford, about Sam's life with Jessica.. Not… "What are you feeling NOW that she's gone?".. which is how he had been back then, which he realizes now that hindsight was twenty/twenty had been pretty damn insensitive… But he could have, should have asked about his life with her.. "How did you two meet?, When did you two move into together?", things like that.. He should have done what he could to help Sam keep the good memories alive instead of constantly forcing Sam into the traumatizing shadows of all the bad memories.. The poor kid had, had enough of THAT with all the nightmares that he hadn't needed other outside influences also dragging him back to that heartbreakingly, soul shredding night as well…

Past Sam gets into the passenger side seat of the Impala.. He doesn't say anything, he just faces forward and stares into space as Past Dean gets in beside him and starts the car and points her in the direction of the coordinates their father had written down in his journal..

They go about a hundred miles before Past Sam falls asleep.. A couple of hundred miles later Sam wakes gasping and flailing with a scream of Jessica's name lingering caught in his throat before he could cry it out.. But Sam plays it off before curling back in on himself, mostly to avoid his big brother's stare, and before he knows it, he's somehow found a way to struggle back into a deep sleep..

About another couple of hundred miles later, he's gasping and jolting awake again…

Past Dean looks over… "You okay?", he asked..

"Yeah, I'm fine." Past Sam had replied dutifully..

"Another nightmare?" Dean had asked.. and Sam had only cleared his throat and sat up a little straighter in response which made Past Dean pull out the big guns.. "Want to drive for a while?"

Sam had almost gone for some silver to make sure it was really his big brother sitting beside him "In your whole life, you never once asked me that.."

"Just thought you might want to… Never mind.." Past Dean had sounded highly offended Present day Dean wanted to tell him to just get over himself already.. Geez, why did his Past Self always take whatever Sam said so personally?

"Look man, you're worried about me, I get it and thank you.. But I'm perfectly okay..", Even then Dean could tell Sam had been lying through his teeth, but now Present day Dean understood WHY.. Sam had thought he needed to keep it all in (and honestly considering what all the kid had been trying to keep inside back then, he had done AMAZINGLY well, especially as far as Winchesters go.. Because if it had been Dean in Sam's shoes he would have laid waste to just about anything he came within reaching distance of, and THAT would have been him trying to hold it al in, he couldn't even imagine the volatile force that HE himself would create if he let all of something like Sam had been trying to carry, out…)..

"Alright, where are we?", Past Sam asked to cover his blatant lie as he starts unfolding the map...

Sam's desperation to find his father is deeper now than it was before.. Sam needs to find him.. Needs to know how to find the thing, how to KILL the thing that killed Jessica, that murdered their daughter.. It's all he wants out of hunting and once he's done that, he doesn't really care about what happens to him after that. As long as that Yellow Eyed bastard is gone for good and his father and brother are safe when it's all said and done because he still wants them to get to have the 'normal' and 'safe' that he had been wanting to try to give them when he went off to Stanford in the first place.. He sometimes can't help but feel torn.. He could still finish out College.. He could still give his father and brother the lives they deserved to have, the kind of lives he had stolen from them simply by just existing.. But he didn't want to, the place held too many painful memories.. And didn't that make his selfish? Here he was risking the goals he had been trying to achieve to help his father and brother get free of hunting, only to drag them in possibly even deeper just for his cause…. Didn't that make him exactly like his dad?.. Actually.. Didn't that make him worse than his dad?

He hopes his dad is at the coordinates he wrote down.. Maybe if he talks to his father, explains just what it was he had been trying to achieve by going away to College, maybe if he tells his dad all the reasons why he needs to know everything about the monster that killed his and Dean's mom.. Maybe he can get his father to take Dean and run and leave the hunt for the evil Yellow Eyed monster to him and him alone?.. After all if HE'S the reason Mary died then he should be the one to kill the Yellow Eyed bastard that he must have somehow set on her when he was still just a baby.. He doesn't know how that would be possible.. But he knows that over two years ago his father had sounded convinced that he was the reason that THING had set its sights on their family… All he knows is that if he is responsible for bringing that thing into the lives of his family, which seems more likely now than ever as the thing had targeted Jessica, then he should be the one responsible for getting rid of it… No one else's lives and happiness should be risked in the quest to go after this thing.. not his father's and damn sure not his big brother's..

But when he looks at the map all he can see is NOTHIING… nothing but woods right in the coordinates their father had marked down.. What would their father be sending them to the middle of nowhere?

He asks Dean as much and of course his concerns get brushed off as if they don't matter.. They had their orders and all that mattered to Dean were those orders.. And since what mattered to Dean and their dad were the only things that mattered AT ALL, once again what Sam wanted and needed, what Sam was concerned with, DID NOT matter and would not matter… Which served to remind him of just one of the reasons he had left in the first place..

Sam had ALWAYS hated going into a situation blind and with too many unanswered questions..

And when civilians got thrown into the mix. Well the situation went from aggravating to dangerous in seconds flat, because, well, he and Dean still didn't even know why their father had given him these particular coordinates, they still didn't know what was their father was expecting them to do here.. What it was that they might be supposed to hunt let alone how to kill it.. So the fact that Hailey had hired a guide named Roy to take her and even her little brother Ben out into an area where he knew for that there was the possibility thatt an honest to god actual monster was lurking, put Sam on edge in a way he hadn't known possible.. He was all kinds of testy, because he was desperate just to talk to his father and from the looks of things, his father wasn't here,, Of course his father wasn't here.. Because HE actually needed him…And not in just any normal way a kid might need their parent.. He had actually had someone (Two someones) close to him get targeted by a monster! Wasn't his father SUPPOSED to HELP people LIKE HIM?!.. But where was he, huh, where was the Great John Winchester, when someone actually NEEDED HIM?!, He was off chasing what was important to John Winchester and screw the hunt he had left in the middle of, that he had left DEAN to go into blind and alone if Dean hadn't gone to Stanford first..

And now there was THIS hunt.. Something John had left for DEAN to take care of, for Dean to go into blind, because John was too busy doing what JOHN wanted… And there were civilians traipsing around in the woods unprotected and unaware of all the things that could possibly be in these woods..

And of course Dean didn't seem to have his head (the one actually on his shoulders at least) in the game, because Dean seemed too busy trying to play 'cute' and 'cocky' with Hailey and too busy trying to chat up Roy and get a feel for if the man had any kind of clue about THEIR kind of hunting, to pay enough actual attention to their surroundings, which Dean proved by almost stepping right into a bear trap.. Thank god Roy at least knew to pay attention to the ground for signs of more things than just animal tracks..

When they came across what had been Hailey's big brother, Tommy's campsite, the scene was gruesomely splattered with blood, the tents were shredded and all kinds of camping gear was strewn all over the ground…

Then Hailey started calling out for Tommy and Sam hurried over to her and 'shushed' her, telling her that 'something' might still be out there.

And he still didn't know WHAT that something might be so he didn't want to take any chances.

A few beats later, a voice that sounded human called out for help and everyone, dropped everything, the gear, the satellite phone and most of the weapons and went running in the direction the human sounding shouts of help had come from…

But when they all got to the area the shouting had seemed to come from, there was nothing but an eerily omnipresent feeling of dread curling in Sam's chest as he started thinking the worst..

"Everyone back to camp.." Sam commanded feeling his dread grow even more..

When they got back to the ruins of Tommy's campsite all the packs were gone.. confirming that whatever it was they were after was smart and that it had distracted them so it could still their packs, cutting them off and keeping them from calling for help, keeping them from the weapons that might actually do something against it..

He got Dean out of the earshot of the others then thumped through their father's journal to show Dean the entry on Wendigos.

At first Dean had been adamant that Wendigos never came out this far West, but Sam pointed out, the claws, the way it could mimic a human voice and Dean was like "Great.." as he un-cocked his gun "Then 'this' is useless.".. And Sam had just wanted to say "Well, duh.. Kinda why I wanted to know more before coming out here, kinda why I didn't want to have to deal with civilians out here in all this danger too, because now were IN 'Shit Creek' with no boat, let alone a paddle..", but he had settled for "We gotta get these people to safety.."

Then he had tried to do just that, but Roy had thought he knew better than Sam and Sam just about lost it.. He didn't care if Roy was a civilian, the man was putting not only Hailey's and Ben's lives at risk, he was putting DEAN'S life at risk, because with all the civilians around (and it didn't help any that one of them was a pretty girl), Dean wouldn't be able to focus on anything but trying to keep 'the regular people' safe, which was what Sam wanted too, but he wanted them 'safely' OUT OF HERE so he and Dean could just do their damn jobs and get back on the road, because maybe, maybe they could still catch up with their dad.. Especially with the way Dean drove… So Sam just went with it and told Roy off, told him how if he and Dean didn't get Roy's stupid sorry as out of there the thing out there was going to hunt him down and eat him alive, he had even almost popped off "Oh yeah, you ever hunt a Wend..", but Dean had jumped in the middle and pushed him back with a firmly commanded "Chill out!"..

And then of course Hailey made it known that her brother Tommy, might still be alive and that she wasn't leaving without him.. And Dean hadn't even argued the finer points of at least taking Roy and Ben and falling back to the Ranger's Station so they (the ones with actual experience with this crap) could go find Tommy for her.. No Dean had just been firm in his stance of doing nothing that could actually get these people out of harm's way..

No, Dean had just laid it out on how the thing was a good hunter in the day, but an even better hunter at night, and that it was getting late, so they needed to settle in and protect themselves..

Sam had to admit drawing the Anasazi symbols around the camp to keep the Wendigo out had been a good idea..

Had.. being the key word.. Of course Roy had been a skeptic, but for the time being he had seemingly been okay to just suspend his skepticism enough to stay inside the lines of those symbols..

Past Dean approached Past Sam… "Wanna tell me what's going on in that 'freaky' head of yours?", Present day Dean thinks he could have, should have, picked a better, more sensitive, word than 'freaky'..

"Dean…"

"No, you're not fine..", "No, really?!" Present day Dean wanted to scoff at his Past Self's spectacular observational skills.. The day before these events had unfolded his Past Self had met a man who was still holding on to the trauma of the deaths of people he loved, even more than forty years later and that had been just one day in that man's past.. Sam's trauma had been on going throughout almost his entire life and to top it all off, the most recent of Sam's traumas had been the tragic loss of not only the woman he had loved, but his unborn child as well and it had happened just a little more than a week before the events of these particular memories.. Oh yeah, Sam had definitely not been okay.. But had Past Dean really cared about anything other than how much of inconvenience it had been to be partnered up with a hunter who didn't have their mind focused on THE JOB?.. Not really..

"You're like a powder keg. It's not like you." Past Dean continued "I'm supposed to be 'the belligerent one', remember?', Present day Dean realizes that ONE, back then he had said that as if to say 'I'm the only one that's allowed to be belligerent to people whenever I'm in a pissy mood or whenever the hell else I feel like it, really, but however, YOU are not allowed to be pissy or belligerent at all, and I don't really care how you're feeling at the moment so long as you stop trying to behave like you have rights to act like a normal person who's basically been through the worst kinds of losses, because you're not even a person, you're a soldier, a hunter and you need to lock it down and toughen up.." and TWO, if his Past Self had truly realized his brother was a 'powder keg', he should have stepped up and gotten everyone the hell out of Dodge, because being so emotionally distraught actually made Sam more of a target and with Sam's mind not completely into a hunt of this caliber that in itself should have been enough to make his Past Self realize how much he was putting Sam and everyone else at risk by not getting ALL of the people with such highly strung emotions, which included Hailey and Ben as well as Sam, out of the woods and out of the Wendigo's hunting range.. Because OF COURSE Jessica's death would have messed with Sam's head, and his Past Self should have known better than to go dragging someone with something like that hanging over their heads into a hunt, because it should have been obvious that Sam wouldn't have been able to stay focused on just THAT hunt.. not with everything going to hell all around them and civilians who shouldn't have been there all thrown into the mix.. it's a wonder anyone had gotten out of the situation alive, with one hunter that had too much on their plate and another hunter who wasn't experienced enough to take on what they were facing but willing to go in half-cocked without caring about the consequences or just who might have to pay those consequences…

And now that Present day Dean looks back on it, how could his Past Self not have heard the emotions in Sam's voice as Sam stated "Dad's not here.."?.. How could he have missed how distraught and stressed and just stretched thin when Sam had been barely been able to keep it together as he said "I mean, that much we know for sure, right?.. He would have left us a message, a sign, right?"…, And after Past Dean had confirmed that even he himself doubted their father had ever even come up into those woods, how desperate Sam sounded as he asked "Why are we still even here?"

And Past Dean, all he had cared about were his father's unspoken orders when he should have cared about getting Sam out of harm's way.. His Past Self had just took a seat across from Sam and fished out his dad's journal "This is why… This book.. This is dad's single most valuable possession. Everything he knows about every evil thing is in here. And he's passed it on to us.. I think he wants us to pick up where he left off.. You know?.. Saving people, hunting things, the family business."

Past Sam's anger had been brewing and there was so many responses that he would have loved to give to Dean's little speech.. Responses like "Not EVERY evil thing, I know he knows more about Yellow Eyes than he ever let on, than he ever wrote down in that journal.. And I don't care what 'dad' wants, I don't care about 'hunting things' or 'the family business'. All I care about is finding and killing ONE THING and keeping what little family I have left from dying in a war that I apparently somehow caused!".. But instead he had just given a frustrated "That makes no sense.." (because it really didn't), Sam wiped his eyes, Past Dean should have picked up on the fact that Sam had, had tears steadily pooling in his eyes, but he hadn't and Sam's desperation, his sadness, his fear and angst became as obvious as the sun on a clear summer day.. "Why, why doesn't he just call us? Why doesn't he tell us what he wants (Cause Sam just wanted to know what the hell it was his father wanted from them, from HIM.. Was there some sort of special test he had to pass just to get into John Winchester's circle?.. What?), where he is?" Sam had clearly been on the verge of desperately begging and the evidence that tears might not be able to be kept at bay any longer as Sam's voice cracked.. Almost every emotion had been coming out in Sam's voice, coming out through all the ways his voice cracked, Sam's fear, his pain, his loss, his anger, his soul deep sorrow, his dismay and confusion, his aching need to just have the answers he sought, it had all been there in Sam's voice back then, yet Past Dean had been cluelessly passing it off as Sam's loss of Jessica, but if he had listened, really listened back then to the sound of Sam's voice, he would have heard the tell, tale signs that there had been so much more to it than what he had thought…

But Past Dean had simply said "I don't know.. But the way I see it.. Dad's given us a job to do and I intend to do it.."

Sam was a mess of frayed nerves and gutted emotions.. "Dean..", he whispered pleadingly.. Desperately begging "No..", trying to say what he needed to say without saying too much, without putting all of THIS onto Dean's shoulders "I gotta find dad..", and if Sam's sheer desperation hadn't been clear before, it should have been ringing every single one of Past Dean's alarm bells by now, because Sam was obviously distraught, obviously desperate, and it was so obvious it hurt as the tears nearly broke free and Sam's voice hitched when he said "I gotta find Jessica's killer.", like he had been BEGGING for Dean to not question him, for once, the same way Dean had never really questioned their father, he had been begging for Dean to understand his need and for Dean to see HIS NEED as something more important than everything else, just this once… And he wasn't really giving a damn if it made him selfish.. He had already had too much taken away by this life, by 'supernatural' forces and he honestly just wanted to kill the one and only monster that was on his hit list and then be done with it all.. "It's the only thing I can think about..", half of Sam's face had been concealed by shadows in that moment, but now Present day Dean knows that there had been a tear that had gratefully taken advantage of the discretion those shadows had provided..

"Okay, alright, Sam, we'll find them… I promise.", His Past Self had vowed, but his vow had been made more to placate Sam and keep him from taking off to go trying to find that Yellow Eyed bastard on his own.. "Listen to me, you've gotta prepare yourself.. I mean, this search could take a while.. And all that anger.. You can't keep it burning over the long haul.. It's gonna kill you..".. Present day Dean wanted to slap his Past Self upside the head and tell him to learn how to practice what he preaches "You gotta have patience, man..".. Present day Dean wants to curl up and die laughing.. He honestly can't believe that HE had preached at Sam about learning to have patience.. Oh god, no wonder Sam was so screwed up, constantly being told to stay within a certain set of lines by the people who drew those lines as he watched those people dance happily outside those same lines and watched those people redraw those lines whenever and however the hell they had wanted to, all while telling Sam.. "Un, un, un… No, no, Sam… If YOU cross the lines you'll be branded a family abandoning traitor (Oh wait you've already been branded as that, well, it'll be a million times worse if you dare to cross THESE lines).. But WE can cross whatever lines we want, push whatever binderies we want, break whatever laws we want, BUT.. YOU, if you do anything even half as bad as us.. Well, we might just come to think you're going Darkside on us and we might end up getting it in our heads that YOU might have to be stopped, might have to be KILLED if you can't be saved.. But hey.. Enjoy whatever little 'freedoms' you still have inside those lines, because if you don't or if you dare get the nerve to ask for MORE 'freedom' then you'll be branded as 'ungrateful' too (Oh, wait, well you've already been branded that one too.. oh well, sucks to be you.. but just remember it can always get worse, we can always make it worse..)…", like telling Sam that EVERY rule and law and order applied to him, while JOHN and Dean didn't HAVE to really abide by anything besides what they WANTED to abide by…

Sam's confusion, his fear had been evident as he pleadingly asked "How do you do it?", as if he had been BEGGING, please tell me, how to do this, how to get through THIS.. How to live with THIS… "How does dad do it?", which had been more like asking 'How could he do this to us?'…

"Well, for one, them.." Past Dean looked over towards Hailey and Ben "I mean, I figure our family's so screwed to hell, maybe we can help some others. It makes things a bit more bearable… And I'll tell you what else helps.. Killing as many evil sons of bitches as I possibly can..", Sam gave a sad smile in response, but his own emotions had still been churning too much to really piece together what his big brother had said.. The moment was interrupted when the human like voice once again called for help from out in the woods..

Sam felt wary, he didn't know if he and Dean were ready for this..

Thankfully Dean understood what the Wendigo's intentions were "It's trying to draw us out..", Past Dean had stated calmly "Just stay cool, Stay put.."

Roy's sarcastic "Inside the magic circle", had set Past Sam's teeth on edge.. Then the thing had given a bone-chilling growl that no animal could muster, because there had been HUMAN INTENT in that growl "Okay.." Roy had stated nervously "That's no grizzly..", making Sam want to reply with "No, shit, Sherlock.", but he had held his tongue.. Hailey was smart to pull Ben down to sit with her on a log by the fire which was in the middle of the circle.. That had put Sam at just the slightest of ease.. If they could just be reasonable and actually STAY there.. Maybe everyone might make it through this night alive..

But then ROY had started shooting at the thing, thinking normal bullets would actually do it any kind of harm, then being convinced he had 'hit it' Roy had been stupid enough to leave the circle and go off into the trees, putting EVERYONE'S lives in danger.. Past Dean ordered Hailey and Ben to not move from the circle as he and Past Sam had charged full tilt into the woods to try to save Roy from his own stupidity..

But then they had 'lost' Roy, couldn't tell where it was he had gone or where he had possibly been 'taken' to.. Leaving Sam feeling emotionally raw… There was another civilian dead that didn't have to be, that wouldn't have been if they had just gotten them out of there when they had still had the chance.. That had hit Sam hard.. Sure he didn't believe that he could 'save' people.. but that didn't mean he felt any less responsible when he failed to save them, which was a conundrum that Present day Dean knew he was going to have to help unravel for the kid.. Because no one should have that kind of battle waging inside them.. Because it was a battle that no one could win.. and what broke Present day Dean's heart was he was pretty sure that the fact it could never be won was the exact reason why Sam always fought it…

The fact that one person died when he could have done more to 'save' them had Past Sam thinking a lot about Jessica.. About how he might have been able to 'save' Jessica, how he might have been able to 'save' Angel.. and he catches himself threading Jessica's necklace in between his fingers on more than one occasion and he knows he needs to get his head on straight or else more people could die…

Then Hailey and Dean had gotten snatched, leaving Sam with nothing more than a THEORY of how to kill the Wendigo and a boy who was still basically just a kid and Sam hadn't known what the hell to do.. Past Sam was frantic with panicky need.. Because he needed to find Dean alive or else there was really nothing left to live for, not even going after Yellow Eyes.. his father would take care of that anyway.. if Dean went, he'd be going too and nothing would be keeping him from going over that ledge.. losing Jessica, losing Angel they had almost been bad enough to kill him, but losing Dean would decimate him and he didn't understand why losing DEAN would kill him more than losing his own child had… Present day Den thinks it might have something to do with what Ash had said when they had wound up in Heaven, how SOULMATES share a Heaven.. Well, he and Sam had shared a Heaven.. as un-pretty as it had been, they had been there TOGETHER, and he knows now that Zachariah had kept at least Sam from seeing what his REAL 'Greatest Hits' would have been and he's starting to wonder about his own.. Because what FOUR YEAR OLD thinks the memory of his parents fighting over the phone over what may have been a potential split up is a good memory?.. and yeah.. The 'BEST Fourth of July EVER' had been good, but he knows what happened AFTER had NOT been good.. Because really he and Sam had burnt down someone's field for crying out loud! Of course they had gotten punished! And of course Dean had gotten it worse (or thought he had.. now that Present day Dean has seen the kinds of BEATINGS Sam used to get he doesn't think he can really begrudge Sam for not getting as many swats on the rump on that particular night).. bad enough to make the memory of that night cause some serious angst…

Past Sam had thanked the heavens for Dean's love of brightly colored, candy coated chocolate, because they stood out on the forest floor and were like a homing beacon that led right to the Wendigo's lair.. There was a terrifying moment when he and Ben almost ran into the Wendigo and Ben had would have screamed and gotten them both killed if Sam hadn't clasped a hand over Ben's mouth right in the nick of time.. Past Sam had held in a baited breath waiting for the Wendigo to pass.. Then he nudged Ben into forward momentum again.. They weren't that much further in when the sound of creaking boards gave them just enough time to think "Oh crap.", then they were falling through a shaft and crashing hard into the unforgiving stone floor of the chamber below.. Sam had been knocked out for the briefest of seconds, and it was Ben's gasp of alarm that had roused him more than anything, the kid was his responsibility after all, and it had sounded like he had needed him.. He gave a hurried look over and saw a heap of HUMAN skulls and bones and put a hand on Ben's shoulder to calm the kid down… But then he had laid eyes on Dean, and his heart had given a painful stutter in his chest, because for half a second he had thought.. he had thought that Dean was dead.. but then he steeled himself and went over and gave his brother a gentle shake as he worriedly called Dean's name.. And felt so damned relieved when Dean had opened his eyes.

Past Sam had cut Dean down and braced him to keep Dean from having a rough impact with the ground, then he had braced Dean and shielded him as best he could as he helped Dean limp over to the stone wall of the chamber and helped Dean sit so he could lean against a thin wooden pillar before asking his big brother "You sure you're okay?" as he started to finish untying Dean's wrists the rest of the way..

Past Dean's 'tough guy' response had been a painfully grunted "Yeah.. Yeah.. Where is it?"

"It's gone for now.." Had been Past Sam's relieved reply..

Then Hailey had gotten sight of Tommy.. Past Sam had feared this outcome and it had been one of the biggest reasons Sam had wanted to keep her and Ben as far from this as possible… Now the sight of their brother's dead body hanging from the ceiling of some chamber of a mine, would be forever branded in their minds.. He really had wanted to spare them that.. But now all he could do was be there.. Ready to provide whatever kind of emotional support they might need, he was even prepared to take a few punches to the face if that's what they needed because he knew the ways that, that kind of pain could make a person need to lash out .. But as Hailey touched the side of Tommy's face, Tommy gave a shocked and terrified gasp, causing Sam to nearly jump out of his skin..

"Cut him down.." Hailey had pleaded.. and that's exactly what Sam had intended on doing before he had even known that Tommy was still alive.. His blade was so sharp it easily sliced through the rope and Sam helped brace Tommy's fall the same way he did Dean's but then Tommy's family were pulling Tommy into their arms and laying him down on the chamber's floor.. The happy reunion warmed Sam's heart and things were really looking up all around as Dean found two flare guns.. Sam just really hoped that burning the damned Wendigo would really kill it for real and for good..

Past Dean took point while Sam stayed back with Hailey and Tommy, but then they all heard the Wendigo's frightening growl and knew it was back…

"Looks like someone's home for supper.."

Hailey had learned enough to know the damned thing was FAST "We'll never outrun it..", she said, stating the obvious..

Past Dean ordered Hailey, Ben and Tommy to stay with Sam because Sam would get them out… While HE went and distracted the Wendigo…

But turns out the mine had one hell of an echo, Past Dean had basically gone the wrong way, while Past Sam had damn near walked right into the damn things jaws.. Sam ordered the others to get Tommy out as he went to stand off against the Wendigo alone.. Sam hid in a shadowy nook and waited, waited for the Wendigo to appear from the crevice beside him.. Except.. the Wendigo was above him on the other side, Sam jumped away and fired his only flare at the creature, missing the thing by only inches and now he was out of the only ammunition he had, had available that could actually kill it.. So he did the only thing he could think of.. he ran.. Because if he died right now, Ben, Hailey and Tommy would be sitting ducks.. He could at least get to them and still maybe even get them out of here alive.. But he hadn't planned on the chamber being walled up, making a literal dead end for the four of them to run into..

"Get behind me." Sam commanded, as if that would do any good, maybe he was thinking if the Wendigo killed him first that it might give enough time for Dean to get there with the last flare.. Boy, he sure hoped that Dean didn't miss, because while he might be willing to throw himself into the literal jaws of death, he hated to think that everyone else would have to die too and it killed him to think that his big brother wouldn't make it out of this alive.. The Wendigo was drawing nearer and Sam was honestly feeling a little terrified because he was so certain that the innocent civilians, whose safety he had tried to ensure, were going to die and that there was nothing he could do to protect them.. But then a shouted "Hey!" echoed through the chamber and when the Wendigo turned around, Past Dean had shot it square in the center of its chest, saving everyone… And that made Present day Dean hate himself even more, because even when the chips were down and death had seemed imminent, Sam had thought of his big brother as a hero who had saved the day, even when his big brother had been the reason everyone had still been in danger in the first place, rather than safe back at the Ranger's Station.. Present day Dean gets it now.. It had been a close call.. Way.. TOO CLOSE of a call.. and honestly the only reason they had gotten out of there alive had been shear dumb luck.. Luck that the flare had actually worked to kill the Wendigo.. Luck that the Wendigo hadn't been just a tad bit smarter, smart enough to get the flares wet so they wouldn't work.. Luck that the Wedigo hadn't got in a swipe at Sam after Sam had missed and before Sam had, had the chance to try to get away.. Luck that Dean had gotten there on time.. It had basically ALL boiled down to LUCK… That and there may have been angelic involvement from Zachariah even then as it would have really ruined Zach's plans if both he and Sam would have died back then.. And now that he thinks about it.. He might HAVE died back then, when the Wendigo had first knocked him out, the bastard had hit him hard enough to cave his skull in.. It makes his stomach churn to think that maybe he had been dead when Past Sam had first found him and that he had only 'woken up' because Zachariah had sent him back…

When it was all over, they got Tommy back to the Ranger's Station and Sam had stood close to Ben to help make sure he told the carefully constructed lie he and Dean had come up with correctly.. It seemed like it hadn't been hard to get the local cops and Par Rangers to believe that a nine hundred pound grizzly had been the 'thing' that tore up the campsite killed a whole bunch of campers, killed Roy and injured Tommy, Dean and Hailey..

Hailey had done a little more flirting with Dean, but it wasn't anything more than trying to wind down, Past Dean had played it cool and Hailey had given him a chaste peck on the side of his face for luck then told him that she hoped he found his father, then she gave Sam a curt and brief "Thanks, Sam."

It had made the brothers feel a little bit better about themselves to know they had saved all three members of Hailey's, Tommy's and Ben's close knit family..

"Man, I hate camping.." Dean had stated vehemently..

"Me too.." Sam had readily agreed, because to THEM, 'camping' had always meant something different than it did to normal people…

"Sammy, you know we're gonna find dad, right?"

"Yeah I know." Sam had replied as he tried to keep his growing frustration and impatience in check.. "But in the meantime.. I'm driving.." , he stated as he decided to take Dean up on his offer.. After all, driving would help keep him distracted from the dark and terrifying thoughts and nightmares that keep trying to drag him under.. And it would help him to keep his anger in check and help him focus on being 'patient' like his big brother had suggested..

Past Dean's response had been to simply toss Sam the keys and as the Impala's engine roared to life and the radio began to blare, the scene faded to black.. Leaving Dean and Angie standing in the abysmal void once again.


End file.
